

Class . 


Book W& 1 t 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 






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BY THE SAME AUTHORS 


THE LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR 
THE PRINCESS PASSES 
MY FRIEND THE CHAUFFEUR 
LADY BETTY ACROSS THE WATER 
THE CAR OF DESTINY 
THE PRINCESS VIRGINIA 


THE 

BOTOR CHAPERON 

// 

C^N. & aYm. WILLIAMSON ' 


NEW YORK 

THE McCLURE COMPANY 
1907 


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Ccr-^C/ 2- 

Copyright, August, 1907, by The McClure Company w 


UE-KAKY - f CO.^HSSS 
Two Cogias -TteC-iv^l 


AUG 3 1907 


. Copyright entry 

A^z/^7 

CLASS XXc. No, 

i$34J0 



Copyright , 1906-7, 6y TVi* Butterick Publishing Co., Ltd. 


MR. G. VAN DER POT 

PRESIDENT OF THE ROTTERDAM SAILING AND ROWING CLUB 
WHOSE KIND AND NEVER-FAILING HELP ADDED 
TENFOLD TO THE PLEASURES OF / OUR 
VOYAGE THROUGH DELIGHTFUL 
DUTCH WATERWAYS 

WE DEDICATE 

THE STORY OF THE TOUR 

























































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CONTENTS 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. . . . 3 

II 12 

III 23 

IV ... 36 

V 45 

VI 63 

VII 72 

RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 

VIII 87 

IX 108 

X. . . . . 118 

XI. , 134 

XII 147 

XIII 160 

XIV 170 

XV . • 178 

XVI .183 

XVII 190 

XVIII 200 

XIX. 208 

XX 222 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 


viii 

PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 

CHAPTER RAGE 

XXI 235 

XXII 243 

XXIII 260 

XXIV 270 

XXV 279 

XXVI 284 

RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT 
OF VIEW 

XXVII 301 

XXVIII 314 

XXIX 328 

XXX 339 

XXXI 348 

XXXII 353 

XXXIII 365 

XXXIV 369 

XXXV 384 

XXXVI 389 

XXXVII 402 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 




NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 


I 

S OMETIMES I think that having a bath is the nicest 
part of the day, especially if you take too long over 
it, when you ought to be hurrying. 

Phyllis and I (Phil is my stepsister, though she is 
the most English creature alive) have no proper bath-room 
in our flat. What can you expect for forty pounds a year, even 
at Clapham ? But we have a fitted-up arrangement in the box- 
room, and it has never exploded yet. Phyllis allows herself 
ten minutes for her bath every morning, just as she allows her- 
self five minutes for her prayers, six to do her hair, and four 
for everything else, except when she wears laced-up boots; but 
then, she has principles, and I have none; at least, I have no 
maxims. And this morning, just because there were lots of 
things to do, I was luxuriating in the tub, thinking cool, 
delicious thoughts. 

As a general rule, when you paint glorious pictures for 
yourself of your future as you would like it to be, it clouds 
your existence with gray afterwards, because the reality is 
duller by contrast; but it was different this morning. I had 
stopped awake all night thinking the same things, and I was 
no more tired of the thoughts now than when I first began. 

I lay with my eyes shut, sniffing Eau de Cologne (I’d poured 
in a bottleful for a kind of libation, because I could afford to 
be extravagant), and planning what a delightful future we 
would have. 

“I should love to chop up Phil’s type- writer and burn the 
3 


4 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

remains,” I said to myself; “but she’s much more likely to 
put it away in lavender, or give it to the next-door-girl with 
the snub nose. Anyhow, I shall never have to write another 
serial story for Queen-Woman , or The Fireside Lamp , or any 
of the other horrors. Oh the joy of not being forced to create 
villains, only to crush them in the end ! No more secret doors 
and coiners’ dens, and unnaturally beautiful dressmakers’ 
assistants for me! Instead of doing typing at ninepence a 
thousand words Phil can embroider things for curates, and 
instead of peopling the world with prigs and puppets at a 
guinea a thou’, I can — oh, I can do anything. I don’t know 
what I shall want to do most, and that’s the best of it — just 
to know I can do it. We’ll have a beautiful house in a nice 
part of town, a cottage by the river, and, best of all, we can 
travel — travel — travel. ” 

Then I began to furnish the cottage and the house, and 
was putting up a purple curtain in a white marble bath- 
room with steps down to the bath, when a knock came at 
the door. 

I knew it was Phil, for it could be nobody else; but it was 
as unlike Phil as possible — as unlike her as a mountain is un- 
like itself when it is having an eruption. 

“Nell,” she called outside the door. “Nell, darling! Are you 
ready ?” 

“Only just begun,” I answered. “I shall be — oh, minutes 
and minutes yet. Why ?” 

“I don’t want to worry you,” replied Phil’s creamy voice, 
with just a little of the cream skimmed off; “but — do make 
haste. ” 

“Have you been cooking something nice for breakfast ?” 
(Our usual meal is Quaker oats, with milk; and tea, of course; 
Phil would think it sacrilegious to begin the day on any other 
drink.) 

“Yes, I have. And it’s wasted .” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 5 

“Have you spilt — or burnt it ?” 

“No; but there’s nothing to rejoice over or celebrate, after 
all; at least, comparatively nothing.” 

“Good gracious! What do you mean?” I shrieked, with 
my card-house beginning to collapse, while the Eau de Co- 
logne lost its savor in my nostrils. “Has a codicil been found 
to Captain Noble’s will, as in the last number of my serial 
for ” 

“No; but the post’s come, with a letter from his solicitor. 
Oh, how stupid we were to believe what Mrs. Keithley wrote 
— just silly gossip. We ought to have remembered that she 
couldn't know; and she never got a story straight, anyway. 
Do hurry and come out.” 

“I’ve lost the soap now. Everything invariably goes wrong 
at once. I can't get hold of it. I shall probably be in this bath 
all the rest of my life. For goodness’ sake, what does the law- 
yer man say ?” 

“I can’t stand here yelling such things at the top of my 
lungs.” 

Then I knew how dreadfully poor Phil was really upset, for 
her lovely voice was quite snappy; and I’ve always thought she 
would not snap on the rack or in boiling oil. As for me, my 
bath began to feel like that — boiling oil, I mean; and I 
splashed about anyhow, not caring whether I got my hair wet 
or not. Because, if we had to go on being poor after our great 
expectations, nothing could possibly matter, not even looking 
like a drowned rat. 

I hadn’t the spirit to coax Phyllis, but I might have known 
she wouldn’t go away, really. When I didn’t answer except 
by splashes which might have been sobs, she went on, her 
mouth apparently at the crack of the door 

“I suppose we ought to be thankful for such mercies as have 
been granted ; but after what we’d been led to expect ” 

“What mercies, as a matter of fact, remain to us ?” I asked. 


6 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

trying to restore depressed spirits as well as circulation with 

a towel as harsh as fate. 

“Two hundred pounds and a motor-boat.” 

“A motor-boat ? For goodness’ sake /” 

“Yes. The pounds are for me, the boat for you. It seems 
you once unfortunately wrote a postcard, and told poor dear 
Captain Noble you envied him having it. It’s said to be as 
good as new; so there’s one comfort, you can sell it second- 
hand, and perhaps get as much money as he has left me.” 

I came very near falling down again in the bath with an 
awful splash, beneath the crushing weight of disappointment, 
and the soap slipping under my foot. 

“Two hundred pounds and a motor-boat — instead of all 
those thousands!” I groaned — not very loudly; but Phil 
heard me through the door. 

“Never mind, dearest,” she called, striving, in that irritating 
way saints have, to be cheerful in spite of all. “It’s better 
than nothing. We can invest it.” 

“Invest it!” I screamed. “What are two hundred pounds 
and a motor-boat when invested ?” 

Evidently she was doing a sum in mental arithmetic. After 
a few seconds’ silence she answered bravely 

“About twelve pounds a year.” 

“Hang twelve pounds a year!” I shrieked. Then some- 
thing odd seemed to happen in my inner workings. My blood 
gave a jump and flew up to my head, where I could hear it 
singing — a wild, excited song. Perhaps it was the Eau de 
Cologne, and not being used to it in my bath, which made me 
feel like that. “I shan't invest my motor-boat,” I said. “I’m 
going a cruise in it, and so are you.” 

“My darling girl, I hope you haven’t gone out of your 
mind from the blow!” There was alarm and solicitude in 
Phil’s accents. “When you’ve slipped on your dressing-gown 
and come out we’ll talk things over. ” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 7 

“Nothing can make me change my mind,” I answered. 
“It’s been made up a whole minute. Everything is clear now. 
Providence has put a motor-boat into our hands as a means of 
seeing life, and to console us for not being Captain Noble’s 
heiresses, as Mrs. Keithley wrote we were going to be. I will 
not fly in Providence’s face. I haven’t been brought up to it 
by you. We are going to have the time of our lives with that 
motor-boat. ” 

The door shook with Phil’s disapproval. “You do talk like 
an American,” she flung at me through the panel. 

“That’s good. I’m glad adoption hasn’t ruined me,” I re- 
torted. “But could you — just because you’re English — con- 
tentedly give up our beautiful plans, and settle down as if 
nothing had happened — with your type- writer ?” 

“I hope I have the strength of mind to bear it,” faltered 
Phyllis. “We’ve only had two days of hoping for better 
things.” 

“We’ve only lived for two days. There’s no going back; 
there can’t be. We’ve burned our ships behind us, and must 
take to the motor-boat. ” 

“Dearest, I don’t think this is a proper time for joking — 
and you in your bath, too,” protested Phil, mildly. 

“I’m out of it now. But I refuse to be out of everything. 
Miss Phyllis Rivers — why, your very name’s a prophecy ! — I 
formally invite you to take a trip with me in my motor- boat. 
It may cost us half, if not more, of your part of the legacy; 
but I will merely borrow from you the wherewithal to pay our 
expenses. Somehow — afterwards — I’ll pay it back, even if I 
have to reestablish communication with heavenly shop-girls 
and villainous duchesses. Oh, Phil, we’ll get some fun out of 
this, after all. Anyhow, we shall go on living — for a few weeks. 
What matter if, after that, the deluge ?” 

“You speak exactly as if you were planning to be an ad- 
venturess ” said Phyllis, coldly. 


8 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 
“I should love to be one,” said I. “I’ve always thought it 
must be more fun than anything — till the last chapter. We’ll 
both embark — in the motor-boat — on a brief but bright ca- 
reer as adventuresses. ” 

With that, before she could give me an answer, I opened 
the door and walked out in my dressing-gown, so suddenly 
that she almost pitched forward into the bath. Phyllis, heard 
from behind a cold, unsympathetic door, and Phyllis seen in 
all her virginal Burne-Jones attractiveness, might as well be 
two different girls. If you carried on a conversation with Miss 
Rivers on ethics and conventionalities and curates, and things 
of that kind from behind a door, without having first peeped 
round to see what she was like, you would do the real Phil an 
injustice. 

There is nothing pink and soft and dimpled about Phyllis’s 
views of life (or, at least, what she supposes her views to be) ; 
but about Phyllis in flesh and blood there is more of that than 
anything else; which is one reason why she has been a constant 
fountain of joy to my heart as well as my sense of humor, 
ever since her clever Herefordshire father married my pretty 
Kentucky mother. 

Phil would like, if published, to be a Sunday-school book, 
and a volume of “Good Form for High Society” rolled into 
one; but she is really more like a treatise on flower-gardens, 
and a recipe for making Devonshire junket with clotted 
cream. 

Not that she’s a regular beauty, or that she goes in for any 
speciality by way of features or eyelashes, or hair, or a figure, 
or anything really sensational of that sort, as I do in one or 
two directions. But there’s a rose and pearl and gold-brown 
adorableness about her; you like her all the better for some 
little puritanical quaintnesses; and if you are an Englishman 
or an American girl, you long to bully her. 

She is taller than I am (as she ought to be, with Burne- 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 9 
Jones nose and eyes), but this morning, when I sprang at her 
out of the bath-room, like a young tigress escaped from its 
cage on its ruthless way to a motor-boat, she looked so piteous 
and yielding, that I felt I could carry her — and my point at 
the same time — half across the world. 

She had made cream eggs for breakfast, poor darling (I 
could have sobbed on them), and actually coffee for me, be- 
cause she knows I love it. I didn’t worry her any more until an 
egg and a cup of tea were on duty to keep her strength up, and 
then I poured plans, which I made as I went on, upon her 
meekly protesting head. 

The boat, it appeared, lay in Holland, which fact, as I 
pointed out to Phil, was another sign that Providence had set 
its heart upon our using her; for w^e’ve always wanted to see 
Holland. We often said, if we ever took a holiday from serials 
and the type- writer, we would go to Holland ; but somehow the 
time for holidays and Holland never seemed to arrive. Now, 
here it was; and it would be the time of our lives. 

Poor Captain Noble meant to use the boat himself this 
summer, but he was taken ill late in the season on the Riviera 
and died there. It was from Mentone that Mrs. Keithley 
wrote what was being said among his friends about a huge 
legacy for us; and we, poor deluded ones, had believed. 

Captain Noble, a dear old retired naval officer, was a friend 
of Phyllis’s father since the beginning bf the world, and, though 
Phil was sixteen and I fifteen when our respective parents 
(widowed both, ages before) met and married, the good man 
took my mother also to his heart. Phil and I have been alone 
in the world together now for three years; she is twenty-two, 
I twenty-one. Though many moons have passed since we saw 
anything of Captain Noble except picture postcards, we were 
not taken entirely by surprise when we heard that he had 
left us a large legacy. It is easy to get used to nice things, and 
far more difficult to crawl down gracefully from gilded heights. 


10 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Crawl we must, however; so I determined it should be 
into that motor-boat floating idly on a canal in Holland. 

The letter from the solicitor (a French solicitor, or the 
equivalent, writing from the Riviera) told us all about the 
boat and about the money. The boat must be got by going or 
sending to Rotterdam, the money obtained in London. 

A thirty horse-power (why not thirty dolphin-power?) motor- 
boat sounds very grand to read about; and as I recovered 
from my first disappointment I began to feel as if I’d sudden- 
ly become proprietor of a whole circus full of champing steeds. 
I tried to persuade Phyllis that I should write better stories 
if I could travel a little in my own motor-boat, as it would 
broaden my mind; therefore it would pay in the end. Besides, 
I wasn’t sure my health was not breaking down from over- 
strain; not only that, I felt it would be right to go; and, any- 
how, I just would go — so there. 

I argued till I was on the point of fainting or having a fit, 
and I’ve no doubt that it was my drawn face (what face 
wouldn’t have been drawn ?) to which Phil’s soft heart and 
obstinate mind finally succumbed. 

She said that, as I seemed determined to go through fire and 
water (I never heard of any hot springs in the canals of Hol- 
land), she supposed she would have to stick by me, for she was 
older than I and couldn’t allow me to go alone under any con- 
sideration, especially with my coloring and hair. But, though 
experience of me had accustomed her to shocks and, she must 
confess, to sacrifices, she had never expected until now that she 
would be called upon for my sake to become an adventuress. 

As for the two hundred pounds, that part didn’t signify. I 
needn’t suppose she was thinking of it; thank Heaven, wheth- 
er we worked or were idle we would still have our settled hun- 
dred and twenty pounds a year each. It was our reputation for 
which she cared most, and she was sure the least evil that 
could befall us would be to blow up. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 11 

“ Better do it on a grand scale in a thirty horse-power 
motor-boat than in a gas-meter bath-tub of a five-room flat in 
Clapham,” I remarked; and somehow that silenced Phyllis, 
except for a sigh. 

Since then I’ve been in a whirl of excitement preparing my 
watery path as a motor-boat adventuress, and buying a dress 
or two to suit the part. It doesn’t even depress me that Phil 
has selected hers with the air of acquiring a serviceable shroud. 

I’ve finished up three serials in as many days, killing off 
my villains like flies, and creating a perfect epidemic of hastily 
made matches among titled heroes and virtuous nursery 
governesses. Scarcely an aristocratic house in England that 
wouldn’t shake to its foundations if fiction were fact; but then 
my fiction isn’t of the kind that anything short of a dislocated 
universe could possibly make fact. 

Phyllis, with the face of a tragic Muse, has been writing 
letters to her clients recommending another typist — quite a 
professional sort of person, who was her understudy once, a 
year or so ago, when she thoughtlessly allowed herself to come 
down with measles. 

“Miss Brown never puts f q’ instead of £ a,’ or gets chapter 
titles on one side; and she knows how to make the loveliest 
curlicues under her headings. Nobody will ever want me 
to come back,” the poor girl wailed. 

“All the better for them, if you’re going to blow up, as 
you are convinced you will,” I strove to console her, as I tried 
on a yachting-cap, reduced to two three-farthings from four 
shillings. But she merely shuddered. And now, when at last 
we have shut up the flat, turned the key upon our pasts, and 
got irrevocably on board the “Batavier” boat, which will land 
us in Rotterdam, she has moaned more than once, “I feel as 
if nothing would be the same with us ever, ever again.” 

“So do I,” I’ve answered unfeelingly. “And I’m glad .” 


II 


T HIS is the first time I have been on a sea-going ship 
since I crossed from America with my mother, 
neither of us dreaming that she would settle down 
and give me an Englishman for a stepfather. As 
for Phil, she has no memories outside her native land — except 
early ones of Paris — and, though she has a natural instinct 
for the preservation of her young life, I don’t doubt that every 
motion of the big boat in the night made her realize how 
infinitely more decorous it would be to drown on the “ Batavier 
4 ” than in a newfangled motor thing on an obscure foreign 
canal. 

The Thames we have seen before, in all its bigness and 
richness and black ugliness; for on hot summer days we have 
embarked on certain trips which would condemn us forever in 
the eyes of duchesses, countesses, and other ladies of title I 
have known serially, in instalments. But we (or rather, I) 
chose to reach Holland by water, as it seems a more appro- 
priate preface to our adventure; and I got Phyllis up before 
five in the morning, not to miss by any chance the first sight 
of the Low Lands. 

We were only just in time, for we hadn’t had our coffee 
and been dressed many minutes before my eyes caught at a 
line of land as a drowning person is supposed to catch at a 
straw. 

“Holland!” said I; which was not particularly intelligent 
in me, as it couldn’t have been anything else. 

There it lay, this stage set for our drama, comedy, tragedy — 
whatever it may prove — of which we don’t yet know the 

12 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 13 
plot, although we are the heroines; and now that I’m writing 
in a Rotterdam hotel the curtain may be said to have rung up 
on the first act. 

Just then it was lifted only far enough to show a long, low 
waste of gray-green, with a tuft or two of trees and a few 
shadowy individuals, which the stage-hands had evidently set 
in motion for the benefit of the leading ladies. 

“We might be the Two Orphans,” I said, “only you’re 
not blind, Phil — except in your sense of humor; and I’m 
afraid there are no wicked Dutch noblemen to kidnap me ” 

“Oh dear, I’m sure I hope not!” exclaimed Phil, looking 
as if a new feather had been heaped on her load of anxieties. 

The line was no longer gray now, nor was it a waste. It 
was a bright green, floating ribbon, brocaded with red flowers; 
and soon it was no ribbon, but a stretch of grassy meadow, and 
the red flowers were roofs; yet meadows and roofs were not 
just common meadows and roofs, for they belonged to 
Holland; and everybody knows — even those who haven’t 
seen it yet — that Holland is like no country in the world, 
except its queer, cozy, courageous, obstinate little self. 

The sky was blue to welcome us, and housewifely Dutch 
angels were beating up the fat, white cloud-pillows before 
tucking them under the horizon out of sight. Even the air 
seemed to have been washed till it glittered with crystalline 
clearness that brought each feature of the landscape strangely 
close to the eyes. 

We were in the River Maas, which opened its laughing 
mouth wide to let in our boat. But soon it was so busy with 
its daily toil that it forgot to smile and look its best for strang- 
ers. We saw it in its brown working-dress, giving water to 
ugly manufactories, and floating an army of big ships, black 
lighters, and broadly built craft, which coughed spasmodically 
as they forged sturdily and swiftly through the waters. Their 
breath was like the whiff that comes from an automobile, and 


14 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I knew that they must be motor-barges. My heart warmed to 
them. They seemed to have been sent out on purpose to say, 
“Your fun is going to begin.” 

At last we were in Rotterdam, steaming slowly between 
two lines of dignified quays, ornamented with rows of trees 
and backed by quaintly built, many-colored brick houses — 
blue and green and pink, some nodding forward, some leaning 
back. The front walls were carried up to conceal the roofs; 
many of the facades tapered into triangles ; others had double 
curves like a swan’s neck; some were cut into steps — so that 
there was great variety, and an effect almost Chinese about 
the architecture of the queer houses with the cranes projecting 
over their topmost windows. There was nothing to be called 
beautiful, but it was all impressive and interesting, because so 
different from that part of the world which we know. 

A gigantic railway bridge of latticed iron flung itself across 
the skyline; one huge white building, like a New York sky- 
scraper, towered head and shoulders above the close-leaning 
roofs of the city; and all among the houses were brown sails 
and masts of ships; water-streets and land-streets tangled 
inseparably together. 

The hum of life — strange, foreign life! — filled the air; an 
indescribable, exciting sound, made up of the wind whistling 
among cordage of sea-going ships, the shouts of men at work, 
the river slapping against piles and the iron sides of vessels, 
the whirr and clank of steam-cranes. Wreaths of brown smoke 
blew gustily in the sunlight ; a train boomed across the latticed 
bridge; and the hoot of a siren tore all other sounds in shreds. 
Creakily our ship was warped in by straining cables, and I 
said to myself, “The overture’s finished. The play is going to 
begin.” 

Phil and I streamed off the boat with the other passengers, 
who had the air of knowing exactly why they’d come, where 
they were going, and what was the proper thing to do next. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 15 
But as soon as we were landed on the most extraordinary 
place, which looked as if trees and houses had sprouted on 
a dyke, all consecutive ideas were ground out of our heads in 
the mill of confusing sights and sounds. Friends were meeting 
each other, and jabbering something which sounded at a 
distance like Glasgow-English, and like no known language 
when you were close enough to catch the words. Porters 
surged round us, urging the claims of rival hotels; men in 
indigo cotton blouses pleaded for our luggage; and altogether 
we were overwhelmed by a tidal wave of Dutchness. 

How order finally came out of chaos I hardly know; but 
when I got my breath it occurred to me that we might tem- 
porarily abandon our big luggage and steer through the 
crowd, with dressing-bags in our hands, to hail an elderly cab 
whose driver had early selected us as prey. 

Before getting into the vehicle I paused, and tried to con- 
centrate my mind on plans; though the quaint picture of the 
Boompjes, and the thought that we , Phyllis Rivers and Nell 
Van Buren, should be on the Boompjes was distracting. I 
did manage, however, to find our boat’s address and the 
name of the caretaker, both of which I had on a piece of paper 
with loose “i’s” and “j’s” scattered thickly through every 
word. All we had to do, therefore, was to tell our moth-eaten 
cabman to drive to the place, show the letters from the solici- 
tor (and perhaps a copy of Captain Noble’s will), claim our 
property from the hands of Jan Paasma, and then, if we liked, 
take up our quarters on our own boat until we could engage 
some one to “work it” for our tour. Luckily, we’d had coffee 
and rolls on board the “Batavier”; so we needn’t bother about 
breakfast, as I said joyously to Phil. 

But Phil, it seemed, did not regard breakfast as a bother. 
She thought it would be fatal to throw ourselves into a for- 
midable undertaking unless we first had tea and an egg, and 
somebody to advise us. 


16 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“We must go to an hotel before we see the boat,” said she, 
firmly. 

“But who’s to give us advice at a hotel ?” I asked with 
scorn. 

“Oh, I don’t know. The manager.” 

“Managers of hotels aren’t engaged to advise young women 
about motor-boats.” 

“Well, then, a — a waiter.” 

“A waiter /” 

“We could ask the head one. And, anyway, he would be 
a man^ 

“My darling child, have we ever depended on a man since 
your father died ?” 

“We’ve never had emergencies, except taking our flat — oh, 
and buying my type-writer. Besides, I can’t bear all I shall 
have to bear without a cup of tea.” 

This settled it. We climbed into that frail shell, our chosen 
cab, and I opened the Dutch phrase-book which I bought in 
London. I wanted to find out what hotel was nearest to the 
lair of our boat, but in that wild moment I could discover 
nothing more appropriate than “I wish immediately some 
medicine for seasickness,” and (hastily turning over the pages) 
“I have lost my pet cat.” I began mechanically to stammer 
French and the few words of German which for years have 
lain peacefully buried in the dustiest folds of my intellect. 

“Oh, dear, how shall I make him understand what we 
want ?” I groaned, my nerves quivering under the pitying 
eye of the cabman, and the early-Christian-martyr expression 
of Phyllis. 

“Don’t ask me,” said she, in icy vengefulness; “you would 
bring me to Holland, and I shouldn’t speak Dutch if I could.” 

“I spik Eengleesh,” announced the cabman. 

I could have fallen upon his bosom, which, though littered 
with dust and grease-spots, I was sure concealed a noble 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 17 
heart. But I contented myself with taking him into my con- 
fidence. I said we had a motor-boat, and wanted to go to a 
hotel as near it as possible. I then showed the precious paper 
with the “i’s” and “j’s” dotted about, and he nodded so much 
that his tall hat, which looked like a bit cut out of a rusty 
stove-pipe, almost fell off on my nose. 

“You get on my carriage, and I drive you to where you 
want,” he replied reassuringly, making of our luggage a rest- 
ing-place for his honest boots, and climbing into his seat. 

Magnetized by his manner, we obeyed, and it was not until 
iwe had started, rattling over the stone-paved street, that Phil 
bethought herself of an important detail. 

“Wait a moment. Ask him if it’s a nice hotel where he’s 
taking us.” 

I stood up, seized the railing of the driver’s seat to steady 
myself, and shrieked the question above the noise of the 
wheels, 

“I take you right place,” he returned; and I repeated the 
sentence to Phyllis. 

“That’s no answer. Ask him if it’s respectable; we can’t 
go if it isn’t. Ask him if it’s expensive; we can’t go if it is.” 

I yelled the message. 

“I take you hotel by-and-by. You see Rotterdam a little 
first.” 

“But we don’t want to see Rotterdam first. We want break- 
fast. Rotterdam by-and-by.” 

A sudden bump flung me down onto the hard seat. I half 
rose to do battle again; then, as I gazed up at that implacable 
Dutch back, I began dimly to understand how Holland, 
though a dot of a nation, tired out and defeated fiery Spain. 
I knew that no good w r ould be accomplished by resisting that 
back. Short of hurling ourselves out on the stones, we would 
have to see Rotterdam, so we might as well make the best 
of it. And this I urged upon Phil, with reproaches for her 


18 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

niggardliness in not buying Baedeker, who would have put 
stars to tell us the names of hotels, and given us crisp maps 
to show where they were situated in connection with other 
things. 

I should think few people who have lived in Rotterdam for 
years have really seen as much of the town as we saw on this 
clear blue morning. 

At first the information bestowed upon us by the owner of 
the back seemed an adding of insult to injury. How dared he 
explain what he was forcing us to see in spite of ourselves ? 
But, by-and-by, even Phyllis fell to laughing, and her dimples 
are to her temper what rainbows are to thunder-showers — 
once they are out there can be no more storm. 

“I feel as if we’d seen samples of all Holland, and were 
ready to go to our peaceful home again,” said Phil, after we’d 
driven about from the region of big shops and imposing ar- 
cades, to shady streets mirroring brown mansions in glassy 
canals; on to toy villages of miniature painted houses, stand- 
ing in flowery gardens, far below the level of adjacent ponds 
adorned with flower-islands; through large parks and intricate 
plantations; past solemnly flapping windmills; far beyond, to 
meadows where black and white cows recognized the fact that 
we were not Dutch and despised us for it; then back to parks 
and gardens again. “I shouldn’t think there could be any sort 
of characteristic thing left which we haven’t met with. I’m 
sure I could go home now and talk intelligently about Hol- 
land.” 

We couldn’t help being interested in everything, though we 
were seeing it against our wills; yet it was a relief to our 
feelings when the Back unbent to the extent of stopping be- 
fore an old-fashioned, low-built hotel, close to a park. So far 
as we could judge, it was miles from anywhere, and had no 
connection with anything else; but we were too thankful for 
the privilege of stopping, to be critical. The house had an air 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 19 
of quiet rectitude which appealed to Phil, and without a word 
she allowed our luggage to be taken off the cab. 

When we came to pay, it appeared that our driver hadn’t 
made us acquainted with every secret of Rotterdam, purely in 
a spirit of generosity. We were called upon to part with almost 
all the gulden we had got in exchange for shillings on board 
the boat, and Phil looked volumes as it dawned on her in- 
telligence that each one of these coins (with the head of an 
incredibly mild and whiskered old gentleman upon it) was 
worth one and eightpence. 

“At this rate we shall soon be in the poorhouse,” she said. 

“If it comes to that, we can stop the motor-boat at villages 
and solicit alms,” I suggested. 

After all, the Back had had some method in its madness, 
for on showing the caretaker’s address to a giant hall-porter, 
it appeared that the place was within ten minutes’ walk of the 
hotel. We refused to decide upon rooms until our future plans 
had shaped themselves; and our luggage reposed in the hall 
while we had cups of tea and a Dutch conception of toast in a 
garden, whose charms we shared with a rakish wandering 
Jew of a tortoise. 

Many times since I induced Phyllis to join me in becoming 
an adventuress, have we vaguely arranged what we would do 
on arriving at Rotterdam. The program seemed simple enough 
from a distance — just to go and pick up our boat (so to 
speak) and motor away with it; but when we actually started 
off, pioneered by a small boy from the hotel, to take posses- 
sion of our property, I had a horrid sinking of the heart, which 
I wouldn’t for many heads of whiskered old gentlemen on 
gulden have confessed to Phil. I felt that “something was going 
to happen.” 

The “ten minutes’” walk prolonged itself into twenty, and 
then there was a ferry over a wide, brown, swift-flowing 
stream. This brought us to a little basin opening from the 


20 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

river, where one or two small yachts and other craft nestled 

together. 

“Look!” I exclaimed, with a sudden throb of excitement, 
which bubbled up like a geyser through the cold crust of my 
depression. “ There she is !” 

“Who ?” cried Phyllis, starting. “Any one we know ?” 

“Our boat, silly. ‘Lorelei/ I suppose you think she ought 
to be called ‘White Elephant’?” 

Yes, there she was, with “Lorelei” in gold letters on her 
bows, this fair siren who had lured us across the North Sea; 
and instead of being covered up and shabby to look at after 
her long winter of retirement and neglect, she had the air of 
being ready to start off at a moment’s notice to begin a cruise. 

Every detail of her smart white dress looked new. There 
was no fear of delay for painting and patching. Clean cocoa- 
nut matting was spread upon the floor of the little decks fore 
and aft; the brass rails dazzled our eyes with their brilliance; 
the windows of the roofed cabin were brighter than the Ko- 
hi-nur, the day I went to see it in the Tower of London; 
basket-chairs, with pink and blue and primrose silk cushions, 
stood on deck, their arms open in a welcoming gesture. There 
was a little table, too, which looked born and bred for a tea- 
table. It really was extraordinary. 

“Oh, Nell, it is a pretty boat!” The words were torn from 
Phil in reluctant admiration. “Of course it’s most awfully 
reckless of us to have come, and I don’t see what’s going to 
happen in the end; but — but it does seem as if we might enjoy 
ourselves. Fancy having tea on our own deck! Why, it’s al- 
most a yacht! I wonder what Lady Hutchinson would say 
if she could see us sitting in those chairs ! She’d be polite to 
me for a whole month. ” 

Lady Hutchinson is Phil’s one titled client. Long ago her 
husband was a grocer. She writes sentimental poetry, and her 
idea of dignity is to snub her type-writer. But I couldn’t con- 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 21 
centrate my mind on the pleasure of astonishing Lady Hutch- 
inson. I was thinking what a wonderful caretaker Jan Paasma 
must be. 

“Conscientious” hardly expressed him, because it’s almost a 
year since Captain Noble used “Lorelei,” and we hadn’t writ- 
ten that we were coming to claim her; yet here she was, en fete 
for our reception. But then, I thought, perhaps our dear old 
friend had left instructions to keep the boat always ready. It 
would be rather like him : and, in any case, we should soon know 
all, as Mr. Paasma’s dwelling is a little green house close to the 
miniature quay. We saw his name over the door, for evidently 
he doesn’t entirely depend upon his guardianship of boats for 
a livelihood. He owns a shop, with indescribable things in the 
one cramped but shining window — things which only those 
who go down to the sea in ships could possibly wish to have. 

For all we could tell he might be on board the boat, which 
floated a yard or two from shore, moored by ropes; but it 
seemed more professional to seek Mr. Paasma under his own 
roof, and we did so, nearly falling over a stout child who was 
scrubbing the floor of the shop. 

“What a queer time of day to be cleaning — eleven o’clock,” 
muttered Phil, having just saved herself from a tumble. I 
thought so too; but then we’d been in Holland only a few 
hours. We hadn’t yet realized the relative importance of cer- 
tain affairs of life, according to a Dutchwoman’s point of view. 

We glared reproachfully at the stout child, as much as to 
say, “Why don't you finish your swabbing at a proper hour ?” 
She glared at us as if she would have demanded, “What the 
(Dutch) Dickens do you mean by bouncing in and upsetting 
my arrangements ?” 

Little was accomplished on either side by this skirmishing; 
so I put my pride in my pocket and inquired for her master. 

“Boot,” replied the creature. “Boot,” pointing with her 
mop in the direction whence we had come. 


22 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

We understood by this that the caretaker was at his post, 
and we returned to shout the name of Heer Paasma. 

Nothing happened at first; but after several spasmodic 
repetitions a blue silk curtain flickered at one of the cabin 
windows on “Lorelei,” and a little, old, brown face, with a 
fringe of fluff round the chin, appeared in the aperture — a 
walnut of a face, with a pair of shrewd, twinkling eyes, and a 
pipe in a slit of a mouth. Another call brought on deck a figure 
which matched the face; and on deck Mr. Paasma (it looked 
like a gnome, but it could be no other than the caretaker) 
evidently intended to remain until he got a satisfactory ex- 
planation. 


Ill 


4 4 A RE you Heer Paasma ?” I inquired from my distance. 

The walnut nodded. 

/ ^ “Do you speak English ? ” 

Out came the pipe. “Ja, a leetle.” 

“We’re Miss Rivers and Miss Van Buren, from England. 
I’m Miss Van Buren. You have heard about me, and that 
Captain Noble left me his motor-boat in his will.” 

“No, I not heerd.” A dark flush slowly turned the sharp 
little walnut face to mahogany. 

“How strange! I thought the solicitor would have written. 
But perhaps it wasn’t necessary. Anyway, I have all the 
papers to prove that the boat is mine. You did know poor 
Captain Noble was dead, surely ?” 

“Ja, I hear that.” 

“Well, if you’ll put a plank across, we’ll come on board, 
and I’ll show you my papers and explain everything.” 

“I come on shore,” said Mr. Paasma. 

“No, we would rather — ” 

I might have saved my breath. Mr. Paasma was Dutch, 
and he had made up his mind what would be best. The rest 
goes without saying. He seized one of the ropes, hauled the 
boat closer to shore, and sprang onto the bank. 

There was a strange glitter in his eye. I supposed it to 
be the bleak glint of suspicion, and hastened to reassure the 
excellent man by producing my papers, pointing out para- 
graphs which I placed conspicuously under his nose, in our 
copy of Captain Noble’s will, and the letters I had received 
from the solicitor. 


23 


24 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“You see,” I said at last, “everything is all right. You need 
have no hesitation in giving the boat to me.” 

Mr. Paasma puffed at his pipe, which he held very tight 
between his teeth, and stared at the papers without look- 
ing up. 

“If you like, you can apply to your lawyer, if you have 
one,” I went on, seeing that he was far from easy in his mind. 
“I’m quite willing to meet him. Besides” — I had suddenly a 
brilliant idea — “I have relations in Rotterdam. Their name 
is the same as mine — van Buren. Perhaps you have heard of 
Heer Robert van Buren ?” 

“Ja,” replied Mr. Paasma, biting his pipe still harder. 
Instead of looking happy, his face grew so troubled that I 
wondered whether my mention of these unknown relatives had 
been unfortunate. — whether, by any chance, a member of the 
family had lately committed some crime. Meanwhile, Phyllis 
stared. For my own reasons I had refrained from speaking to 
her of these relations; now, urged by necessity, I brought them 
to light; but what they might be, or whether they still existed 
in Rotterdam I knew no more than did Phil. 

“Mynheer van Buren is a known man,” said the caretaker. 
“You not send for him. I think the boat is to you, missus. 
What you want do ?” 

“First of all, we want to go on board and look at her,” I 
replied. 

This time, rather to my surprise, he made no objections. 
A dark pall of resignation had fallen upon him. In such a 
mood as his, an Indian woman would go to Suttee without a 
qualm. He pulled the boat to shore, placed a plank, and with 
a thrilling pride of possession we walked on board. 

There were some steep steps which led down from the 
deck to the cabin, and Phyllis and I descended, Mr. Paasma 
stolidly following, with an extraordinary expression on his 
walnut face. It was not exactly despairing, or defiant, or 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 25 
angry, or puzzled; but it held something of each one of these 
emotions. 

However, I soon forgot about the caretaker and his feelings 
in admiration of “Lorelei. ” Aft, you looked down into the mo- 
tor-room, with a big monster of machinery, which I respected 
but didn’t understand. From that, when you’d crossed a little 
passage, you had to go down some more steps into a cabin 
which was so charming that I stood still on the threshold, and 
said, “Oh!” 

“Why, it’s prettier than our drawing-room!” exclaimed 
Phil; “and my favorite colors too, green and white. It’s almost 
like a boudoir. Who could have supposed Captain Noble 
would have so much taste ? And do look at that darling old 
Dutch clock over the — the buffet or whatever it is, with all 
the little ships rocking on the waves every time it ticks. ” 

We were both so much excited now that we began to talk 
together, neither of us listening to the other. We opened the 
door of what Phil called the “buffet,” and found neat little 
piles of blue-and-white china. There were tiny tablecloths 
and napkins too, and knives and forks and spoons. On one of 
the seats (which could be turned into berths at night) stood a 
smart tea-basket. We peeped inside, and it was the nicest tea- 
basket imaginable, which must have come from some grand 
shop in Bond Street, with its gold and white cups, and its 
gleaming nickel and silver. In the locker were sheets and 
blankets; on a bracket by the clock was a book-shelf with glass 
doors, and attractive-looking novels inside. 

“How pathetic it is!” I cried. “Poor Captain Noble! He 
must have enjoyed getting together these nice things; and 
now they are all for us. ” 

“And here — ok , this is too sad ? His poor, dear shirts and 
things,” sighed Phil, making further discoveries in another, 
smaller cabin beyond “Drawers full of them. Fancy his leav- 
ing them here all winter — and they don’t seem a bit damp.” 


26 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I followed her into a green -and -pink cabin, a tiny den, but 
pretty enough for an artist instead of an old retired sea-cap- 
tain. 

“What shall we do with them ?” she asked. “We might 
keep them all to remember him by, perhaps; only — they 
would be such odd sorts of souvenirs for girls to have, and — 
oh, my goodness, Nell, who could have dreamed of Captain 
Noble in — in whatever it is ?” 

Whatever it was, it was pale-blue silk, with lovely pink 
stripes of several shades, and there was a jacket which Phil 
was just holding out by its shoulders, to admire, when a slight 
cough made us turn our heads. 

It is strange what individuality there can be in a cough. 
We would have sworn if we’d heard it while locked up with 
Mr. Paasma in a dark cell, where there was no other human 
being to produce it, that he couldn’t have uttered such an 
interesting cough. 

Before we turned, we knew that there was a stranger on 
“Lorelei,” but we were surprised when we. saw what sort of 
stranger he was. 

He stood in the narrow doorway between the two cabins, 
looking at us with bright, dark eyes, like Robert Louis Steven- 
son’s, and dressed in smart flannels and a tall collar, such as 
Robert Louis Stevenson would never have consented to wear. 

“I beg your pardon,” said he, in a nice, drawling voice, 
which told me that he’d first seen the light in one of the 
Southern States of America. 

“I beg yours,” said I. (Somehow Phil generally waits for 
me to speak first in emergencies, though she’s a year older.) 
“Are you looking for any one — the caretaker of our boat, 
perhaps ? ” 

His eyes traveled from me to Phil; from Phil to the blue 
garment to which she still clung; from the blue garment to 
the pile of stiff white shirts in an open drawer. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 27 

“No — o, I wasn’t exactly looking for any one,” he slowly 
replied. “I just came on board to — er ” 

“To what , if you please ?” I demanded, beginning to 
stiffen. “I’ve a right to know, because this is our boat. If 
you’re a newspaper reporter, or anything of that sort, please 
go away; but if you have business ” 

“No, it was only pleasure,” said the young man, his eyes 
like black diamonds. “I didn’t know the boat was yours.” 

“Whose did you think it was ?” 

“Well, as a matter of fact, I — er — thought it was mine.” 

“What do you mean ?” I cried, while Phil threw a wild, 
questioning look at the shirts, and dropped the blue silk jacket. 

“That is, temporarily. But there must be some mistake.” 

“There must — a big mistake. Where’s the caretaker ? He 
came on board with us.” 

The young man’s eyes twinkled even more. “Did he know 
it was your boat ?” 

“Why, of course, we told him. It was left to us in a will. 
We’ve just come to claim it.” 

“Oh, I think I begin to see. I shouldn’t wonder if Paasma 
has now taken to his bed with a sudden attack of — whatever 
the Dutch have instead of nervous prostration. He didn’t 
know you were coming ?” 

“Not till we came.” 

“It must have been quite a surprise. By Jove, the old fox! 
I suppose he hadn’t got the shadow of a right, then, to let the 
boat to me ?” 

“ My gracious ! ” breathed Phyllis, and shut up the drawer 
of shirts with a snap. I don’t know what she did with the blue 
silk object, except that it suddenly and mysteriously disap- 
peared from the floor. Perhaps she stood on it. 

“What an awful thing,” said I. “You’re sure you’re not 
in the wrong boat ? You’re sure he didn’t let you some other 
one ?” 


28 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Sure. There is no other one in Holland exactly like this. 
I’ve been on board nearly every day for a week, ever since I 
began to ” 

“Since you began ” 

“To have her done up. Nothing to speak of, you know; 
but she’s been lying here all winter, and — er — I had a fancy 
to clean house ” 

“Then — all these things are — yours ?” 

“Some of the things ” 

“The Dutch clock, the deck-chairs, the silk cushions, the 
curtains, and decorations in the cabin ” 

“I’m afraid you think I’m an awful meddler; but, you see, 
I didn’t know. Paasma told me he had a right to let the boat, 
and that I could do her up as much as I liked.” 

“The old wretch!” I gasped. “And you walk on board to 

find two strange girls rummaging among your — your ” 

Then I couldn’t help laughing when I remembered how Phil 
had suggested our keeping those things for souvenirs. 

“I thought I must be having a dream — a beautiful 
dream.” 

I ignored the implied compliment. “What are we going 
to do about it ?” I asked. “It is our boat. There’s no doubt 
about that. But with these things of yours — do you want to 
go to law, or — or — anything ?” 

“Good heavens, no! I ” 

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said I. “Let’s get the care- 
taker here, and have it out with him. Perhaps he has an 
explanation.” 

“He’s certain to have — several. Shall I go and fetch him ?” 

“Please do,” urged Phil, speaking for the first time, and 
looking adorably pink. 

The young man vanished, and we heard him running up 
the steep companion (if that’s the right word for it) two steps 
at a time. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 29 

Phil and I stared at each other. “I knew something awful 
would happen,” said she. “This is a judgment.” 

“He’s too nice looking to be a judgment,” said I. “I like 
his taste in everything — including shirts, don’t you ?” 

“Don’t speak of them,” commanded Phil. 

We shut the drawers tightly, and going into the other cabin, 
did the same there. 

“Anyhow, I saw ‘G. Noble’ on the sheets and blankets,” 
I said thankfully. “There are some things that belong to us. ” 

“It will end in our going home at once, I suppose,” said Phil. 

“However else it ends, it won’t end like that, I promise 
you,” I assured her. “I must have justice.” 

“But he must have his things. Oh, Nell, have you really 
got relatives in Rotterdam, or did you make that up to frighten 
the caretaker ?” 

“No; they exist. I never spoke of them to you, because I 
never thought of them until we were coming here, and then 
I was afraid if I did you’d think it the proper thing to im- 
plore the females — if any — to chaperon us. Besides, rela- 
tions so often turn out bores. All I know about mine is, that 
mother told me father had relations in Holland — in Rotter- 
dam. And if she and I hadn’t stopped in England to take care 
of you and your father, perhaps we should have come here 
and met them long ago.” 

“Well, do let’s look them up and get them to help. I won’t 
say a word about chaperons.” 

“Perhaps it would be a good thing. That wicked old care- 
taker seemed to be struck with respectful awe by the name 
of Van Buren.” 

“I never knew before that you were partly Dutch. ” 

“You did. I’ve often boasted of my Knickerbocker blood.” 

“Yes. But ” 

“Didn’t you know it was the same thing ? Where’s your 
knowledge of history ?” 


30 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I never had much time to study American history. There 
was such a lot that came before,” said Phil, mildly; but the 
blood sprang to her cheeks at the sound of a step on the 
stairs. Our rival for possession of the boat had come back 
alone. 

“That old rascal has, with extraordinary suddenness and 
opportuneness, forgotten every word of English, ” he announ- 
ced, “and pretends not to understand German. I can’t speak 
Dutch; can you ?” 

“No,” said I. “Not a syllable. But he spoke English quite 
respectably an hour ago.” 

“That was before he was found out. He can now do nothing 
but shake his head and say ( niets verstaen,’ or something 
that sounds like that. I thought of killing him, but concluded 
it would be better to wait until I’d asked you how you’d like 
it done.” . 

“It ought to be something lingering,” said I. “We’ll talk 
it over. But first, perhaps, we’d better decide what’s to be 
done with ourselves. You see, we’ve come to Holland to have 
a cruise on our new boat ; otherwise, if you liked, we, as the 
real owners, might let her to you, and all would be well. 
Still, it does seem a shame that you should be disappointed 
when you took ‘Lorelei’ in good faith, and made her so pretty. 
Of course, you must let us know what you’ve paid ” 

“A few gulden,” said the young man, evasively. 

“Never mind. You must tell how many. Unfortunately 
that won’t mend your disappointment. But — what can we 
do?” 

“I suppose there isn’t the slightest hope that you could — 
er — take me as a passenger ?” 

“Oh, we couldn’t possibly do that,” hastily exclaimed Phil. 
“We’re alone. Though my stepsister, Miss Van Buren, has 
cousins in Rotterdam, we’ve come from England without a 
chaperon, and — for the present ” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 31 

The young man’s eyes were more brilliant than ever, 
though the rest of his face looked sad. 

“Oh, don’t say any more,” he implored. “I see how it is. 
I oughtn’t to have made such a suggestion. My only excuse is, 
I was thinking — of my poor aunt. She’ll be horribly disap- 
pointed. I care most for her, and what she’ll feel at giving up 
the cruise.” 

“Oh, was your aunt coming ?” I asked. 

“Yes, my Scotch aunt. Such a charming woman. I’m an 
American, you know. Clever of me to have a Scotch aunt, 
but I have. I’ve been visiting her lately, near Edinburgh. 
You would like Lady MacNairne, I think.” 

Phil’s face changed. She is the last girl in the world to be 
a snob; but hearing that this young man had a Scotch aunt, 
with a title, was almost as good as a proper introduction. 
And there really is something singularly winning about 
my countryman. I suppose it is that he has “a way with 
him,” as the Irish say. Besides, it seemed nice of so young 
a man to care so much about a mere aunt. Many young 
men depise aunts as companions; but evidently he isn’t one 
of those, as he beautified “Lorelei” simply to give his aunt 
pleasure. 

“It really does seem hard,” I said. “Now, if only Phyllis 
hadn’t so many rules of propriety — ” But, to my surprise, 
the very thought in my mind, which I hadn’t dared breathe, 
was spoken out next minute by Phil herself. 

“Maybe we might come to some kind of arrangement — as 
you have an aunt,” she faltered. 

“Yes, as you have an aunt,” I repeated. 

“She’d make an ideal chaperon for young ladies,” hastily 
went on the Southerner. “I should like you to meet her.” 

“Is Lady MacNairne in Rotterdam ?” asked Phil. 

“Not exactly; but she’s coming — almost at once.” 

“We don’t know your name yet,” said Phyllis. “I’m Miss 


32 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Rivers; my stepsister is Miss Van Buren. Perhaps you’d 

better introduce yourself. ” 

“I shall be glad to,” returned my countryman. “My name 
is Ronald Lester Starr ” 

“Why, the initials are just right — R. L. S.” I murmured. 

“I know what you mean,” he said, with a nice smile. 
“They say I look like him. I’m very proud. You’ll think I 
ought to be a writer; but I’m not. I paint a little — just enough 
to call myself an artist ” 

“Oh, I remember,” I broke in. “I thought the name sound- 
ed familiar. You had a picture in the Salon this spring.” 

He looked anxious. “Did you see it ?” 

“No — not even a copy. What was the subject ? Horrid 
of me to ask; but, you see, it’s July now, and one forgets.” 

“One does,” he admitted, as if he were pleased. “Oh, it 
was only a portrait of my aunt.” 

“Your Scotch aunt ?” 

“Yes. But if you’d seen it, and then should see her, you 
mightn’t even recognize her. I — er — didn’t try to make a 
striking likeness.” 

“I wish I’d seen the picture,” said I. And I thought Mr. 
Starr must be very modest, for his expression suggested that 
he didn’t echo my wish. 

“Do you think you could let my aunt and me join you ?” 
he asked. “I don’t mean to crowd up your boat; that would 
never do, for you might want to sleep on it sometimes. But I 
might get a barge, and you could tow it. I’d thought of that 
very thing; indeed, I’ve practically engaged a barge. My 
friend and I, who were to have chummed together, if he hadn’t 
been called away — oh, you know, that was a plan before my 
aunt promised to come, quite another idea. But what I mean 
to say is, I got an idea for hiring a barge, and having is towed 
by the motor-boat. I could have had a studio in that way, 
for I wanted to do some painting. I’d just come back from 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 33 
seeing rather a jolly barge that’s to let, when I — er — stum- 
bled on you.” 

“Had you engaged any one to work ‘ Lorelei ’ ?” 

“A chauffeur,” said Mr. Ronald; “but no skipper for 
certain yet. I’ve been negotiating.” 

“Dear me!” I exclaimed. “Must we have a chauffeur and 
a skipper too ?” 

“I’m afraid we must; a man who understands the water- 
ways of Holland. A chauffeur understands only the motor, 
and lucky if he does that. ” 

“Won’t it be dreadfully expensive ?” asked Phyllis. 

“The skipper’s wages won’t be more than five or six dollars 
(a bit more than one of your sovereigns) a week, and the 
chauffeur less. They’ll keep themselves, but I meant them 
to sleep on the barge. The skipper ought to be a smart chap, 
who can be trusted with money to pay the expenses of the 
boat as one goes along — bridge-money and all sorts of things. 
The chauffeur can buy the essence — petrol, you call it in 
England, don’t you ? — but the skipper had better do the 
rest.” 

“It does seem a frightful responsibility for two girls,” said 
Phyllis. 

“Of course, if you’d consent to have my aunt — and me — 
we’d take all the trouble off your hands, and half the expense,” 
remarked Mr. Starr. “My poor aunt is so fond of the water, 
and there’s so little in Scotland ” 

“Little in Scotland ?” 

“Well, only a few lakes and rivers. It does seem hard she 
should be disappointed.” 

“She mightn’t like us,” said Phyllis. 

“She would lo — I mean, she’d be no aunt of mine if she 
didn’t. I’d cut her off with a penny.” 

“It’s generally aunts who do that with their nephews,” 
said I. 


34 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Ah, but she’s different from other aunts, and I’m different 
from other nephews. May I telegraph that she’s to come ?” 

“I thought she was coming.” 

“I mean, may I telegraph that she’s to be a chaperon ? I 
ought to let her know. She might — er — want more dresses 
or bonnets, or something.” 

Phil and I laughed, and so did Mr. Starr. After that, of 
course, we couldn’t be stony-hearted; besides, we didn’t want 
to be. I could see that, even to Phil, the thought of a cruise 
taken in the company of our new friend and that ideal chaper- 
on, his aunt, Lady MacNairne, had attractions which the 
idea of a cruise alone with her stepsister had lacked. 

“Well, in the circumstances, I think we should be callous 
brutes not to say ‘Yes, ’” I replied. 

“I don’t want to force you into consenting from pure 
generosity,” went on Mr. Starr. “If you’d like to consult your 
relations, and have them find out that I’m all right ” 

I laughed again. “I know you better than I do them,” 
said I. “I’ve never seen them yet. I think we can take you 
on faith, just as you’ve taken our claims to the boat. Your 
Scotch aunt alone would be a guarantee, if we needed one. 
A Scotch aunt sounds so extra reliable. But perhaps my 
relatives may be of use in other ways, as they’ve lived in 
Rotterdam always, I fancy. They might even find us a skipper, 
if your negotiations fall through. Anyhow, I’ll write a letter 
from our hotel to the head of the family, introducing myself as 
his long-lost cousin twice removed.” 

“What is your hotel, if I may ask ?” inquired Mr. Starr. 

I told him, and it turned out that it had been his till this 
very morning, when he had removed his things to “Lorelei,” 
with the intention of living on board till he was ready to start. 
Now he proposed to have them taken back to the hotel, and 
rearranged on the barge when his aunt came. As for that sly 
old person, the caretaker, our new friend volunteered to 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 35 
straighten out everything with him, our affair as well as his 
own. 

“When he discovers that we can’t be bothered having the 
law of him, as he richly deserves, he will remember his Eng- 
lish, or I’ll find the way to make him,” said the young man in 
such a joyous, confident way, that thereupon I dubbed him 
our “lucky Starr.” 


IV 


* 4 TT OW funny if I’ve got relations who can’t speak 
I ■ any language except Dutch!” I said, after I’d 
sent a letter by messenger to the address of the 
Robert van Buren found in the directory. 

But half an hour later an answer came back, in English. 
Mine very sincerely, Robert van Buren, would give himself 
the pleasure of calling on his cousin immediately. When I re- 
ceived this news it was one o’clock, and we were finishing lunch 
at the hotel, in the society of Mr. Starr, who had already 
wired to his aunt that she was to play the part of chaperon. 

I read the letter aloud, and Phil and I decided that it sound- 
ed old. 

"Mother spoke once or twice of father’s cousin, Robert 
van Buren; so I suppose he’s about the age my father would 
have been if he’d lived,” I said. “I hope he’ll not turn out 
a horror.” 

"I hope he’ll not forbid you to associate with my aunt and 
me,” cut in Mr. Starr. “It’s a stiff kind of handwriting.” 

“He can’t make me stiff,” said I. “Cousins twice removed 
don’t count — except when they can be useful.” 

“A gentleman in the reading-room to see you, miss,” an- 
nounced the waiter, who could speak English, handing me a 
card on a tray. It was a foreign-looking card, and I couldn’t 
feel in the least related to it, especially as the “van” began 
with a little “v.” 

“Come and support me, Phil,” I begged, glancing regret- 
fully at a seductive bit of Dutch cheese studded with caraway 
seeds, which it would be rude to stop and eat. 

36 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 37 

It’s rather an ordeal to meet a new relation, even if you tell 
yourself that you don’t care what he thinks of you. I slipped 
behind Phil, making her enter the reading-room first, which 
gave me time to peep over her shoulder and fancy we had been 
directed wrongly. There was a man in the room, but he could 
not have been a man in the days when mother was speaking 
of “father’s cousin.” His expression only was old: it might 
have been a hundred. The rest of him could not be more 
than twenty-eight, and it was all extremely good-looking. If 
he were to turn out a cousin I should not have to be ashamed 
of him. He was like a big, handsome cavalryman, with a 
drooping mustache that was hay-colored, in contrast with a 
brown skin, and a pair of the solemnest gray eyes I’ve ever 
seen — except in the face of a baby. 

“Are you Miss Van Buren ?” this giant asked Phil gravely, 
holding out a large brown hand. 

“No,” said Phil, unwilling to take the hand under false 
pretenses. 

It fell, and so did the handsome face, if anything so solemn 
could have become a degree graver than before. 

“I beg your pardon,” said the owner of both, speaking 
English with a Scotch accent. “I have made a deceit.” 

I laughed aloud. “I’m Helen Van Buren,” I said. And 
I put out my hand. 

His swallowed it up, and though I wear only one ring I 
could have shrieked. Yet his expression was not flattering. 
There are persons who prefer my style to Phil’s, but I could 
see that he wasn’t one of them. I felt he thought me garish; 
which was unjust, as I can’t help it if my complexion is very 
white and very pink, my eyes and eyelashes rather dark, and 
my hair decidedly chestnut. I haven’t done any of it myself, 
yet I believe the handsome giant suspected me, and was sorry 
that Phil was not Miss Van Buren. 

“Are you my cousin Robert Van Buren’s son ?” I asked. 


38 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I am the only Robert, van Buren now living,” he answered. 

I longed to be flippant, and say that there were probably 
several dotted about the globe, if we only knew them; but I 
dared not, under those eyes — absolutely dared not. Instead, I 
remarked inanely that I was sorry to hear his father was not 
alive. 

“He died many years ago. We have got over it,” he replied. 
And I almost laughed again; but that angel of a Phil looked 
quite sympathetic. 

In a few minutes we settled down more comfortably, with 
Phil and me on a sofa together, and Cousin Robert on a chair, 
which kept me in fits of anxiety by creaking and looking too 
small to hold him. 

Phil and I held hands, as girls generally do when they are 
at all self-conscious, if they sit within a yard of each other; and 
we all began to talk in the absurd way of new-found relations, 
or people you haven’t seen for a long time. 

We asked Robert things, and he answered ; and when we’d 
encouraged him a good deal, he asked us things too, looking 
mostly as Phyllis. At last we arrived at the information that 
he had a mother and two sisters, who spent the summers at 
Scheveningen, in a villa. Then fell a silence, which Phil tact- 
fully broke by saying that she had heard of Scheveningen. It 
must be a beautiful place, and she’d been brought up with a 
cup that came from there. When she was good, as a child, she 
was allowed to play with it. 

“I should think you were always good,” said Cousin Rob- 
ert. Phyllis blushed, and then he blushed too, under his brown 
skin. “I have also a fiancee at Scheveningen,” he went on, a 
propos of nothing — unless of the blush. 

“Is she a Dutch girl ?” I asked. 

“Oh yes.” 

“I suppose she is very pretty and charming ?” 

“I do not know. I am used to her. We have played together 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 39 
when we were young. I go every Saturday to Scheveningen, 
when they are there, to stay till Monday.” 

“Oh!” said Phil. 

“Oh!” said I. 

Silence again. Then, “It was very good of you to come 
and see us so quickly after I wrote. ” 

“It was my duty; and my pleasure too” (as second thought). 
“You must tell me your plans.” 

So we told them, and Cousin Robert did not approve. “I 
do not think it will do, ” said he, firmly. 

“I’m afraid it must do,” I returned, with equal firmness 
disguised under a smile. 

Phil apologized for me as she gave me a squeeze of the 
hand. 

“We’ve been very happy together, Nell and I,” she ex- 
plained, “but we have never had much excitement. This is 
our first chance, and — we shall be well chaperoned by Lady 
MacNairne.” 

“Yes; but she is the aunt of the stranger young man.” 

“Geniuses are never strangers. He is a genius,” I said. 
“You’ve no idea how his Salon picture was praised.” 

“But his character. What do you know of that ?” 

“It’s his aunt’s character that matters most, and the Mac- 
Nairnes are irreproachable.” 

(I had never heard the name until this morning, but there 
are some things which you seem to have been born knowing; 
and I was in a mood to stake my life upon Lady MacNairne.) 

“It is better that you see my mother,” said Cousin Robert. 

“It will be sweet of her to call on us.” 

“I do not think she can do that. She it too large; and she 
does not easily move from Scheveningen. But if she writes 
you a note, to ask you and Miss Rivers, you will go, is it not ?” 

“With pleasure,” I said, “if it isn’t too far. You see, Lady 
MacNairne may arrive soon, and when she does ” 


40 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“But now I will see my mother, and I will bring back the 
letter. I will drive with an automobile which a friend has lent 
me — Rudolph Brederode; and when you have read the note, 
you will both go in the car with me to Scheveningen to stay 
for all night, perhaps more.” 

“Oh, we couldn’t think of staying all night,” I exclaimed. 
“We’ll stop here till ” 

“It is not right that you stop here. I will go now, and, 
please, you will pack up to be ready. ” 

“We haven’t unpacked yet,” I said. “But we couldn’t possi- 
bly — for one thing, your mother may not find it convenient.” 

My cousin Robert’s jaw set. “She surely will find it con- 
venient.” 

“What people you Dutch are!” the words broke from me. 

He looked surprised. “We are the same like others.” 

“I think you are the same as you used to be hundreds of 
years ago, when you first began to do as you pleased; and I 
suppose you have been doing it ever since. ” 

Cousin Robert smiled. “Maybe we like our own way,” he 
admitted. 

“And maybe you get it !” 

“I hope. And now I will go to order the automobile.” 
He glanced at his watch, an old-fashioned gold one. “In 
an hour and a quarter I will be at Scheveningen. Fifteen 
minutes there will be enough. Another hour and a quarter to 
come back. I will be for you at four.” 

“You don’t allow any time for the motor to break down,” 
I said. 

“I do not hope that she will break down. She is a Dutch car. ” 

“And serves a Dutch master. Oh no; certainly she won’t 
break down.” 

He stared, not fully comprehending; but he did not pull his 
mustache, as an Englishman does, when he wonders if he is 
being chaffed. He shook hands with us gravely, and bowed 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 41 
several times at the door. Then he was gone, and we knew 
that if he didn’t come back at four with that letter from his 
mother, it would be because she — or the motor — was more 
Dutch than he. 

When he disappeared, Phil and I went out into the garden 
for the sole purpose, we told each other, of having coffee; and 
when we saw Mr. Starr sitting with an empty cup and a 
cigarette, we both exclaimed, “Oh, are you here ?” as if we 
were surprised ; so I suppose we were. 

He had caught a glimpse of Cousin Robert, and said what 
a splendid-looking fellow he was — a regular Viking; but when 
we agreed, he appeared depressed. “Oh, my prophetic soul!” 
he murmured. “The cousin will want his mother to go with 
you, and my poor aunt will be nowhere.” 

“His mother is too large for the boat,” I assured him con- 
fidently. Mr. Starr brightened at this, but clouded again when 
he heard that Phil and I were to stop the night with my cousins. 

“They will tear you away from me — I mean, from my 
aunt,” he said. 

I shook my head. “No. It’s difficult to resist the Dutch, 
I find, when they want you to do anything; but when they 
want you not to do anything — why, that is too much. Your 
pride comes to the rescue, and you fight for your life. We’ll 
; promise , if you like; for your aunt’s sake. Won’t we, Phil ?” 

“Yes; for your aunt’s sake,” she echoed. 

“We can depend upon you, then — my aunt and I ?” 

“Upon us and ‘Lorelei.’” 

“You’re angels. My aunt will bless you. And now, would 
you care to look at the barge I’ve got the refusal of ? If you’re 
going to tow her, you ought to know what she’s like. I don’t 
think she’ll put ‘Lorelei’ to shame, though, for she’s good of 
her kind; belongs to a Dutch artist who’s in the habit of 
living aboard, but he has a commission for work in France, 
this summer, and wants to let her. She’s lying near by.” 


42 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Who would have thought, when we arrived a few hours 
before, strangers in Rotterdam, that we would be sauntering 
about the town with an American young man, calmly making 
plans for a cruise in his society ? I’m sure that if a palmist 
had contrived to capture Phil’s virtuous little hand, and fore- 
told any such events, my stepsister would have considered 
them as impossible as monstrous. Nevertheless, she now 
accepted the arrangements Fate made for her, as quietly as 
the air she breathed ; for was not the figure of our future chap- 
eron already hovering in the background, title and old Scotch 
blood and all, sanctifying the whole proceeding ? 

Phil was so enchanted with the barge (which turned out to 
be a sort of glorified Dutch sea-going house-boat) that she 
was fired with sudden enthusiasm for our cruise. And the 
thing really is a delectable craft — stout, with a square-shoul- 
dered bow, and a high, perky nose of brass, standing up in the 
air as one sees the beak of a duck sometimes, half-sunk among 
its feathers and pointing upward. “Waterspin” (which means 
“water-spider”) is the creature’s name, and she is a brilliant 
emerald, lined and painted round her windows with an equal- 
ly brilliant scarlet. This bold scheme of color would be no less 
than shocking on the Thames; but, sitting in that olive-green 
canal, in a retired part of Rotterdam, “Waterspin” looked like 
a pleasing Dutch caricature of Noah’s Ark. 

Inside we found her equally desirable, with four little boxes 
of sleeping-rooms, yellow painted floors, and bunks curtained 
with hand-embroidered dimity, stiff as a frozen crust of snow; 
a studio, with a few charming bits of old painted Dutch furni- 
ture to redeem it from bareness, and a kitchen which roused 
all Phil’s domestic instincts. 

“Oh, the darling blue and white china, and brass things, 
and those adorable pewter pots !” she cried. “I love this boat. 
I could be quite happy living on her all the rest of my 
life.” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 43 

“So you shall! I mean, while she is mine you must con- 
sider yourselves as much at home on her as on your own boat,” 
stammered Mr. Starr. “Or, if you’d rather take up your 
quarters on the barge ” 

“No, no. Nell and I will live on ‘Lorelei’; but I do think, if 
you’ll let me, I’ll come sometimes and cook things in that 
heavenly kitchen.” 

“Let you ? Whatever you make shall be preserved in amber. ” 

“Wouldn’t it be better to eat it ?” asked Phil. 

“Can you cook ? I should as soon expect to see a Burne- 
Jones lady run down the Golden Stair into a kitchen ” 

“I can make delicious toast and tea-cakes and salad dress- 
ing — can’t I, Nell ? — and lots of other things.” 

“Pluperfect. I only wish I could. I shan’t trouble your 
kitchen, Mr. Starr.” 

“But you can sing so beautifully, dear, and sketch, too; 
and your stories ” 

“Don’t dare speak of them!” I glared; and poor Phil, un- 
selfishly anxious to show off my accomplishments to Lady 
MacNairne’s nephew, was silent and abashed. I hoped that 
Mr. Starr hadn’t heard. 

He was delighted with our approval of the barge, and 
enlarged upon the good times before us. No one could know 
Holland properly without seeing her from the waterways, he 
said, and we would know her by-and-by as few foreigners did. 
She could not hide a secret from us that was worth finding out. 
He hadn’t planned any regular tour for himself; he had meant 
to wander here and there, as the fancy seized him; but now 
the route was for us to decide. Whatever pleased us would 
please him. As for his painting, you could hardly go round a 
corner in Holland without stumbling on a scene for a picture, 
and he should come across them everywhere; he had no choice 
of direction. But in seven or eight weeks we could explore the 
waterways pretty thoroughly. Our skipper would be able to 


44 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 
put us on the right track, and let us miss nothing. Had we, 
by-the-by, asked Mr. van Buren if he’d any skippers up his 
sleeve ? Oh, well, it didn’t matter that we’d forgotten. He 
himself had the names of several, besides some men he had 
already seen, and he would interview them all. It was certain 
that in a day or two at most, he could find exactly the right 
person for the place, and we might be sure that while we were 
away at Scheveningen he would not be idle in our common 
interests. 

“After all, even you must admit that men are of some use,” 
said Phil, when we were at the hotel again, waiting for Cousin 
Robert and his car “Supposing you’d had to organize the 
tour alone, as we expected, could you have done it ?” 

“Of course,” I replied, bravely. 

“What! and engaged a chauffeur and a skipper? Who 
would have told you what to do? I’m sure we could never 
have started without your cousin Robert and Mr. Starr.” 

“What has Cousin Robert got to do with it ?” I demanded. 

Phil reflected. “Now I come to think of it, I don’t know 
exactly. But he is so dependable; and there’s so much of him.” 

“I hope there won’t be too much,” said I. 

“I like tall men,” remarked Phil, dreamily. Then she 
looked at her watch.- “It’s five minutes to four. He ought 
to be here soon.” 

“He’ll come inside ten minutes,” I prophesied. 

But he came in three. I might have known he would be 
before his time, rather than after. And he arrived with a nice 
letter from his mother. 

Neither Phyllis nor I had ever been in a motor-car until 
we got gingerly into that one. I had heard her say that she 
would never thus risk her life; but she made no mention of 
this resolution to Cousin Robert. If she had, it would have 
been useless; for without doubt she would in the end have 
had to go; and it saved time not to demur. 


y 


T HE car which stood throbbing at the door of the 
hotel was large and handsome, as if made to match 
my cousin, and it was painted flame color. 

“I am just learning to drive,” said Robert, who 
wore a motoring-cap which was particularly becoming. “I 
do not know much about automobiles yet; soon I shall buy 
one. It is rowing I like best, and skating in winter, though I 
have not time to amuse myself except at the end of weeks, for 
I am manager of my poor father’s factory. But my fiancee 
likes the automobile, and to please her I am learning with my 
friend’s car.” 

“That is good of you,” said Phyllis. 

“Yes, it is,” he replied gravely. “Would you that I drive 
or the chauffeur ? He has more experience. ” 

I left the decision to Phil, as she is the timid one, but to 

my surprise she answered 

“Oh, you, of course.” 

Cousin Robert looked pleased. “Are you not afraid ?” he 
inquired, beaming. 

“Ye — es, I am afraid, for I’ve never been before. But I 
shall be less afraid with you than with him. ” And she glanced 
at a weedy youth who was pouring oil from a long-nosed tin 
into something obscure. 

“Will you sit in front by my side ?” he asked. And it was 
only after Phil had accepted the invitation that he remember- 
ed to hope I wouldn’t mind the chauffeur being in the tonneau 
with me. “It must have been one of you,” he added, “and 
you and I are cousins.” 


45 


46 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Twice removed,” I murmured; but he was helping Phil 
into the car, and did not hear. 

It was a wild moment when we started. But it would have 
looked odd to cling to the chauffeur for protection, so I did 
nothing; and it calmed me to see how Phyllis bore herself. 
She didn’t even grasp the arm of the seat; she merely gazed 
up into Cousin Robert’s face with a sweetly feminine look, 
which said, “My one hope is in you, but I trust you utterly.” 
It was enough to melt the heart of a stone giant, even when 
seen through goggles. I had an idea that this giant was not 
made of stone, and I wondered what the fiancee of my cousin 
twice removed was made of. 

After the first thrill of starting, when we seemed to be tear- 
ing like a tailless comet through a very small portion of space 
not designed to hold comets, I grew happy, though far from 
tranquil. I can’t imagine people ever feeling really tranquil 
in an automobile, and I don’t believe they do, though they 
may pretend. I’m sure I should not, even if I became a pro- 
fessional chauffeur, which heaven forbid. But part of the 
enjoyment came through not feeling tranquil. There was a 
savage joy in thinking every instant that you were going to be 
dashed to pieces, or else that you would dash somebody else 
to pieces, while all the time you knew in your heart that 
nothing of the sort would happen. 

The car went splendidly, and I believe I should have 
guessed it was a Dutch one, even if Cousin Robert hadn’t told 
me; it made so little noise, yet moved so masterfully, and 
gave an impression of so much reserve power. Indeed, I 
might have thought out several nice similes if there hadn’t 
been quantities of trams and heavy drays blundering about, or 
if the inhabitants of Rotterdam had not had a habit of walking 
in large family groups in the middle of the street. The big horn 
through which Robert every now and again blew a mourn- 
ful blast, was confusing when it arrived in the midst of an 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 47 
idea; and a little curved thing (like the hunting-horn of old 
pictures) into which the chauffeur occasionally mewed, was as 
disconcerting to my nerves as to those of the pedestrians who 
hopped out of the way. 

The more we saw of Rotterdam, the more extraordinary 
did the city appear, and the more did I wonder that people 
should refer to it merely as a port. 

“It is not a bad town,” Robert said to Phyllis, in the half- 
fond, half-deprecating way in which, when talking to stran- 
gers, we allude to that spot of earth we happen to inhabit. “I 
would not change to live at The Hague, though the diplomatic 
set give sneers at us and call us commercial. ” 

“Just as Edinburgh sneers at Glasgow,” cut in Phil. 

“Yes, like that. I have been much to Scotland on my busi- 
ness, and I know,” answered Robert. “But we have many 
good things to show strangers, if they would look; pictures, 
and museums, and old streets; but it is not fashionable to 
admire Rotterdam. You should see the Boompjes at night, 
when the lights shine in the water. It is only a big dyke, but 
once it was the part where the rich people lived, and those 
who know about such things say the old houses are good. 
And I should like you to see where I live with my mother and 
sisters. It is an old house, too, in a big garden, with a pond 
and an island covered with flowers. But we do not pass now, 
so you must see it a future day. ” 

To say all this, Cousin Robert had to yell above the 
roar of traffic on the stone pavements; but by-and-by, 
as town changed into country, we left the stones behind 
and came into the strangest road I have ever seen. It ran 
beside a little river — the Seine* — which looked like a canal, 
and it was made of neat, purplish-brown bricks, laid edge 
to edge. 

“Klinker, we call it,” said Cousin Robert. “It’s good for 
driving; never much dust or mud; and when you motor it 


48 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

gives grip to the ‘pneus. ’ It wouldn’t do for us of the Nether- 
lands to leave our roads bare.” 

“Why, what would happen ?” I bent toward him to ask. 
“Would the bottom of Holland drop out ?” 

“I think yes,” he replied, seriously. “The saying is that 
there has been as much of sand laid on the road between 
Rotterdam and The Hague as would reach the top of the 
cathedral spire at Amsterdam, which you will see one day.” 

“Dear me, and yet it’s so low and flat, now,” soliloquized 
Phil. “Lower than the canals.” 

“It is nothing here to some places. We work hard to save 
the country we have made with our hands, we Netherlanders. 
All the streets and gardens of Rotterdam, and other towns too, 
sink down and down; but we are used to that. We do not 
stop to care, but go to work adding more steps up to the 
houses, so we can get in at our doors.” 

“I think you are wonderful,” said Phyllis. 

“I have not done very much myself,” modestly replied 
Cousin Robert. 

“But you would if necessary. I’m sure you’d have been 
like the little boy who saw the trickle of water coming out of 
the dyke, and put his thumb ” 

“Phil, if you bring up that story I’ll ask Cousin Robert van 
Buren to run into a windmill and kill you,” I shrieked over her 
shoulder. 

“But I would not do that,” said he. Oh yes, he really was 
wonderful, my cousin Robert. 

“There is a spot to interest an American,” he deigned to 
fling a sop to me, nodding vaguely upward at some roofs on 
the River Maas. “Did you ever hear of Oude Delftshaven, 
cousin ? But I don’t suppose you have.” 

“Indeed I have!” I shrieked at him. “I wouldn’t be a true 
descendant of Knickerbocker stock if I hadn’t. On July 22, 
1620, some Pilgrim Fathers (I’m not sure whether they were 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 49 
fathers then or afterwards) set sail from Oude Delftshaven 
for America.” 

(I didn’t think it necessary to explain that, Knickerbocker 
as I was, I had absorbed this fact only the other day in “read- 
ing up” Holland.) 

I was still more inclined to be reticent as to the newness of 
my knowledge when it appeared that Phil knew something of a 
poem on the subject by Mrs. Hemans. I could not allow my 
English stepsister to be better informed than I concerning a 
country which I already began to regard as a sort of confiscat- 
ed family estate that ought to have been mine. 

We were going fast now, so fast that the tears came to my 
eyes as the sweet-scented breeze rushed against my lashes. 

“There’s Schiedam,” said Robert, indicating a town that 
stood up darkly out of the green plain. “You know, they 
make the famous ‘Geneva’ there.” 

We had never heard of Geneva in liquid form, but it ap- 
peared that “Geneva” or “Hollands” and gin were all the 
same thing; and Cousin Robert seemed almost offended when 
I said it was nice, with hot water and sugar, for a cold in the 
head. 

I don’t know whether the little Schie is really an idyllic 
stream, or whether the glamor of that azure day was upon it 
for me, but our first “waterway” seemed exquisite, as we spun 
along through country of wide horizons and magic atmosphere. 

There were pretty houses, with balconies screened with 
roses — cataracts of roses, yellow, and pink, and white. We 
flew by lawns like the lawns of England, and thick, dark 
patches of forest, where the sun rained gold. There were mea- 
dows where a red flame of poppies leaped among the wheat, 
and quenched their fire in the silver river of waving grain. 
There were other meadows, green and sunny, where cows were 
being milked into blue pails lined with scarlet; and there were 
bowery tea-gardens divided into snug little arbors for two. 


50 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

where each swain could woo his nymph unseen by the next- 
door swain and nymph, though all couples were in sight from 
the river. 

“Now we’re coming to Delft,” said Robert, long before I 
thought that we could be near that ancient town. “If Rudolph 
Brederode, who lends me this car, were here, he could tell 
much about the history,” my cousin went on, mentioning his 
friend for the second time, as if with pride. “He is the sort 
of fellow who knows all the things to know, though he is a 
great sportsman, too. I never took interest in history, but 
William the Silent is our hero, so even I know of him and 
Delft. It was at Oude Delft he was murdered.” 

“He was one of my heroes when I was a little girl,” said I. 
“I can recall my father telling splendid stories about him — as 
good as fairy tales. The best was about the way he earned the 
nickname of William the Silent.” 

I gazed with interest at the place where one of the greatest 
figures in the history of the world had lived and died. 

A shady, lovable old town it seemed. We drove into a 
pleasant street, which looked so clear and green, from the 
mirror of its canal to the Gothic arch of its close arbor of 
fragrant lime-trees, that it was like a tunnel of illuminated 
beryl. The extraordinary brilliance of the windows added to 
the jewel-like effect. Each pane was a separate glittering 
square of crystal, and the green light flickered and glanced on 
the quaint little tilted spying-mirrors in which Dutch ladies 
see the life of the streets, themselves unseen. 

The houses were of brown or purplish brick, with curiously 
ornamented doorways, the stucco decorations running in wavy 
lines up to the level of the first story windows; the door-steps 
white as pearl in the green glimmer; but there was nothing 
striking in the way of architecture until we swept into sight of 
an old Gothic building, blazing with colored coats -of- arms, 
ancient and resplendent. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 51 

“That’s the Gemeenlandshuis van Delfsland,” said Cousin 
Robert, with a beautiful confidence in our comprehension ; and 
then, slowing down the car before a dark, high wall, with a 
secretive-looking door in the midst, “Here’s the Prinzenhof, 
where William the Silent lived, and where Balthazar Gerard 
killed him.” 

“Oh,” I exclaimed, as he was driving on, “can’t we stop 
— can’t we go in ?” 

“We could, but — I should not like to make us late for 
dinner,” Cousin Robert demurred. 

“Dinner ? Why, it’s ages before dinner, and ” 

“We dine at half-past five,” said he. 

Phil and I gazed at each other with lifted eyebrows. Phil 
was pale, and I felt a sudden constriction of the throat. The 
idea of eating dinner at the hour when our souls cried for tea 
and toast, was little short of ghastly. Noblesse obliged us to 
conceal our loathing, but I did venture meekly to suggest that 
if we drove faster afterwards perhaps we might spare a few 
minutes for the Prinzenhof. 

“There are things in The Hague you will want to stop for, 
too,” said Robert. “But my sisters and I can bring you to 
see the pictures, and the Royal Palace and the Huis ten Bosch 
to-morrow; besides, I remember my mother meant to put off 
dinner for us until six, so we will, maybe, not be too late.” 

One should be thankful for the smallest mercies; and I 
hoped that the craving for tea might have subsided into cal- 
lous resignation by six. What Phil, as a born Englishwoman, 
must have been feeling, I could easily conceive; and it was a 
pity this shock to her system had arrived on our first day, for 
only just before the blow she had said that Holland seemed too 
enchanting: she was glad, after all, that she had come, and 
would like to learn the language. 

Luckily, Cousin Robert had remembered the change in the 
domestic program before it was too late, otherwise I am sure 


52 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

he would have denied us the Prinzenhof, and we should have 
had to sneak back by ourselves to-morrow. As it was we were 
allowed to have our own way, practically for the first time 
since we came to Holland. 

Robert rang a bell, and a man appeared, who let us into 
the courtyard, more like the courtyard of a monastery than a 
palace; and among the historical dust-motes which clung to 
Cousin Robert’s memory was the fact that the place actually 
had been a monastery, sacred to St. Agatha. 

We crossed the courtyard, and just inside another door 
found ourselves on the scene of the great tragedy. 

I knew it by instinct, before anybody told me; for suddenly 
the whole story came back just as I heard it from my father, 
not as I’ve read it in books of history. So vividly did he paint 
each detail, that I used to grow hysterical in my infantine 
way, and he was scolded by mother for “filling the child’s 
mind with horrors.” 

Yes, there was the stairway, with the pale light coming 
from the low window; there was the white wall which had 
been spattered with the hero’s life blood; there was the open 
door of the dining-hall where he had been carried back to die; 
there the white pillar behind which the murderer crouched, 
and there the dark archway through which Gerard had run, 
his heart beating thickly with the hope of escape, and the 
thought of the horse waiting beyond the ramparts and the 
moat. 

I fancied I could see the prince, handsome still, in the 
fashion of dress he affected, since the days of the Water 
Beggars’ fame. A stately figure in his rough and wide-brimmed 
hat, with the silk cord of the Beggars round the felt crown; 
and I could almost smell the smoke from the murderer’s 
pistol, bought with the money William’s generosity had given. 
There were the holes in the wall made by the poisoned bullets. 
How real it all seemed, how the centuries between slipped 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 53 
away ! Let me see, what had the date been ? I ought to remem- 
ber. July 

“Phil, what day of the month is this ?” I demanded with 
a start. 

Phil turned at the open door of the dining-hall, which I 
could see had been made into a museum. 

“July tenth,” she answered promptly; for you can never 
catch Phil tripping as to a date, or a day of the week, even if 
you should shake her out of her first sleep to ask. 

“Then it’s the anniversary of his death!” I exclaimed. 
“July 10, 1584, it was. How strange we should have come on 
the very day! It makes it seem a pilgrimage.” 

“I don’t find it strange,” said Cousin Robert. “Many 
people come every day of the year.” 

Having thus poured the cold water of common sense on 
my sentiment, he dragged us into the dining-hall museum to 
see relics of William, and I should have been resentful, had 
not my eyes suddenly met other eyes looking down from the 
wall. They were the eyes of William the Silent himself when 
he was young — painted eyes, yet they spoke to me. 

I don’t know how fine that portrait may be as a work of 
art, but it is marvelously real. I understood in a moment why 
little, half-deformed Anna of Saxony had been so mad to 
marry him; I knew that, in her place, I should have overcome 
just as many obstacles to make that dark, haunting face the 
fape of my husband. 

Of course I’ve often read that William of Orange was a 
handsome man, as well as a dashing and extravagant gallant 
in his young days, but never till now had I realized how singu- 
larly attractive he must have been. The face in the portrait 
was sad, and as thoughtful as if he had sat to the artist on the 
day he heard the dreadful secret of the fate which Philip of 
Spain and Francis of France were plotting for the Nether- 
lands, the day that decided his future, and gave him his name 


54 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

of “William the Silent.” Yet in spite of its melancholy, al- 
most sternness, it won me as no pictured face of a man ever 
did before. 

“This is a great day for me,” I said to Phil, who was close 
behind; “not only am I seeing Holland for the first time, but 
I’ve fallen in love with William the Silent.” 

I laughed as I made this announcement, though I was half 
in earnest; and turning to see whether I had shocked Cousin 
Robert, I found him in conversation with a tall, black-haired 
young man, near the door. 

The man — he wore a gray suit, and carried a straw hat in 
his hand — had his back to me, and I remembered having seen 
the same back in the museum before we came in. Now he 
was going out, and evidently he and Cousin Robert had rec- 
ognized each other as acquaintances. As I looked, he turned, 
and I saw his face. It was so like the face of the portrait that 
I felt myself grow red. How I did hope he hadn’t overheard 
that silly speech ! 

For a moment his eyes and mine met as mine had met the 
eyes of the portrait. Then he shook hands with Robert and 
was gone. 

“Very odd,” said my cousin the giant, strolling toward 
us again, “that was Rudolph Brederode. And,” he glanced 
at me, “his nickname among his friends is William the 
Silent.” 

“Why ?” I asked, pretending unconsciousness. 

“Don’t you think there is a likeness ?” 

“I’m bad at seeing likenesses,” said I. 

“Why, Nell, I don’t think you are,” Phil defended me 
against myself. “You’re always seeing the strangest resem- 
blances between clouds and animals, and plants and people, 
and there’s no end to what you find on wall papers. This 
very day you thought Mr. Starr like Robert Louis Stevenson, 
though I ” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 55 

“That’s when my imagination’s running loose,” I explained. 
“Cousin Robert is talking about facts.” 

“Oh!” said Phil. 

“It’s rather an ugly portrait,” I went on; “I don’t suppose 
William of Orange was like it one bit.” 

“But we have two reasons for calling Bred erode the Taci- 
turn,” said Robert. “He has a way to keep still about things 
which other people discuss. Sometimes it makes men angry, 
but especially the ladies. Brederode does not care what others 
think; he descends from the great Brederode, but he is dif- 
ferent.” 

“The Water Beggar was brave,” I remarked. 

“Rudolph is brave,” retorted Cousin Robert, firing up. 
“You will think so to-morrow.” 

“What is he going to do ?” I asked. “Something to startle 
Holland ?” 

“Holland has seen him do it before, but you have not. 
You will see him ride better than any one else in the jumping 
contests at the Concours Hippique at Scheveningen. It will 
be a fine show, but Brederode and his horses will be the best. 
My mother has a box. She will take you.” 

“But I thought you were going to take us to The Hague 
and the Iluis ten Bosch ?” 

“That will be in the early morning. Perhaps my sis- 
ters will go; and after we have finished the pictures at 
The Hague, we will meet my mother and my fiancee, 
Freule Menela van der Windt, at the race grounds about 
two, and the show will not be over till seven, so dinner will 
be late.” 

“You Dutch are a strong race,” I murmured. 

“Brederode says he always comes here when he’s anywhere 
in the neighborhood, for a look at the Prinzenhof on the tenth 
of July,” Robert went on. “Odd, is it not ?” 

“No more odd than that we should h^ve been here,” said 


56 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I. But I said this in a low voice; and it’s only a man who is 

in love with a girl who hears her when she mutters. 

“He asked how the automobile was going, and I mentioned 
one or two things that bothered me, so he has gone out to 
talk to the chauffeur,” Cousin Robert continued, unable to 
turn his thoughts from his Admirable Crichton. “Don’t you 
think you’ve seen enough ? It is late; and when I told Bred er- 
ode I was showing Delft to my American cousin and an 
English friend, he said I must take you to the New Church, 
the tomb of William, and of Hugo Grotius. He wanted you to 
go to the Old Church too, and see the place where van Tromp 
lies, but we shall not have time. Besides, it would not please 
Miss Rivers. ” 

“Why not ?” asked Phyllis, large-eyed. 

“You are English, and the English do not like to remember 
that Holland, through van Tromp, swept them off the seas — ” 

“Oh, I remember, he stuck up a broom on the mast,” cut 
in Phil. “But it was long ago.” 

“How is it that the tombs of William and Grotius can be 
in a new church ?” I reflected aloud. 

“It is newer than the other, for it was founded in thirteen 
hundred and something,” said Cousin Robert; “I suppose 
you ought to see it, even if dinner should be late. For, as 
Brederode says, ‘Delft is the heart of Holland, and the New 
Church is the core of that heart.’ It is for us what your West- 
minster Abbey is to you, Miss Rivers. ” 

We went out from the old convent palace with its arched 
windows and narrow doors into the gold and green light of the 
Delft afternoon. In the street outside the courtyard stood the 
automobile, and the chauffeur was polishing something on it 
(people in Holland seem always to be polishing something, if 
they are obliged to stand still for a moment), but Mr. Rudolph 
Brederode, alias William the Silent, had vanished, and I was 
glad. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 57 

We got into the motor-car again, passing with every few 
yards some beautiful old building. But one thing in Delft 
disappointed me; I saw no storks, and I expected the air to 
be dark with storks. 

“I don’t think there are any now,” said Robert, apolo- 
getically, “though Brederode would know.” 

“Isn’t it true that the stork’s the patron saint of Delft ?” I 
asked. “Wasn’t it here you had the fire which nearly ruined the 
city, hundreds of years ago, and the parent storks wouldn’t 
leave their babies, but died covering them up with their wings ? 
And didn’t Holland take the stork, after that, for a kind of 
— of motto for the whole country because it was so brave 
and faithful ? ” 

“Yes,” Robert admitted, “Delft is not tired of storks, but 
storks are tired of Delft. You can offer them nice nests on 
long poles, and all kinds of inducements, to live in a certain 
place, but unless they choose, you cannot make them do 
anything. ” 

“Ah, now I know why the Dutch have canonized storks!” 
I exclaimed. 

And just then we arrived at the New Church, which looked 
inconceivably old, and inside was like a vast prison. But the 
tomb of black and white marble was fine, almost too fine, too 
much encrusted with ornament to perpetuate the memory of 
William the Silent. Still, I felt a thrill as I stood looking at 
the white, recumbent figure of the man who made Holland, 
and altered the face of Europe, resting so quietly after the 
storms of life, with his dog at his feet — the loyal little beast 
who saved him at Malines, and starved to death in the end, 
rather than live on in a dull world empty of its master. 

I lingered for many minutes, remembering the eyes of the 
portrait, so warm with life and power, and Phil had to come 
and lead me away to the tomb of Hugo Grotius, the “miracle 
of Europe.” Even Robert grew warm on the subject of 


58 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Grotius, and put him ahead of Pitt, as the youthful prodigy 
of the world. What had he left unaccomplished when he was 
eighteen ? And what story had ever been written by Dumas, 
or any other, to compare with his in melodramatic interest ? 
I didn’t know enough details of the brilliant being’s history to 
argue (although I have always the most intense yearning to 
argue with Cousin Robert), but I made a note to read them 
up, in case I should ever be called upon to write a historical 
novel at short notice. 

Robert discouraged Phil from buying the ware of Delft on 
its native heath, and we spun along twice as fast in leaving the 
town as we had in coming, either because a Dutchman’s 
dinner-hour is sacred, or because this particular Dutchman 
was anxious to exchange our society for that of his fiancee. We 
flew over the smooth klinker road at such a rate that, had it 
been England, a policeman would have sprung from every 
bush. Nobody seemed to mind here, however; and the few 
horses we met had the air of turning up their noses at us, 
despite the physical difficulty in evoking that .expression on an 
equine profile. 

The country grew prettier. It was the sort of landscape 
old-fashioned artists used to produce out of their abundant 
imagination, scorning to be tied down by models, dashing in 
anything charming or outre which they happened to think of 
at the moment, and jumbling together an extravagant whole 
too good to be true. But there were only a few miles of it 
left after Delft : and we hadn’t reveled in impossibly delicious 
farm-yards and supernaturally bowery gardens half long 
enough, when we ran into the outskirts of The Hague — “S. 
Gravenhage,” as I love to call it to myself. 

Until this moment, I’d been mentally patronizing Holland, 
admiring it, and wondering at it, of course, but half-conscious- 
ly saying that quaintness, snugness, and historical interest 
were all we could expect of the Low Country. Elegance and 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 59 
beauty of form we mustn’t look for: but I found myself 
surrounded by it in The Hague. There were streets of tall, 
brown palaces, far finer than the royal dwelling which Robert 
pointed out; the shops made me long to spring from the car 
and spend every penny set apart for the tour; the Binnenhof — 
that sinister theater of Dutch history — with its strangely 
grouped towers and palaces, and its huge squares, made me 
feel an insignificant insect with no right to opinions of any 
kind; and as I gazed up at the dark, medieval buildings, 
vague visions of Cornelis and John de Witt in their torture, 
of van Oldenbarneveld, and fair Adelaide de Poelgust stabbed 
and bleeding, flitted fearfully through my brain. I wanted to 
get out and look for the stone where Adelaide had fallen to 
die (how well I remembered that story, told in twilight and 
firelight by my father !), and only the set of Robert’s shoulders 
deterred me. What was a romantic fragment of history, com- 
pared to the certainty that the roast would be overdone ? 

But when we swept into the green-gold dusk of the forest, 
I forgot such trivialities as buildings made by man. 

Suddenly we were in a different world, an old, old world, 
with magic that lurked in each dusky vista, breathed from the 
perfume of leaf and fern, and whispered in the music of the 
trees, as if we had strayed upon the road that leads to fairy- 
land. 

“Fancy seeing fairyland from the motor-car!” I said to 
myself. “I never thought to go in such a fashion, though I’ve 
been sure that one day or another I would find the way there 
through such a forest as this.” 

I felt that, if I walked here alone, I might see something 
more mysterious than alder-trees, than giant beeches, and 
ancient oaks; than glints of flower-strewn waters shining out of 
shadow in green darkness deep and cool; than rustic bridges 
twined with creepers, or kiosks glimmering at the end of long, 
straight alleys. I should have seen processions of dim figures; 


60 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

chanting Druids and their victims; wild, fierce warriors, and 
blue-eyed women, their white arms and the gold of their long 
hair shining through the mist of centuries. 

But then, I was in the motor-car: and though Robert, in a 
different and more sketchy costume, would have been a gallant 
Batavian warrior, there would be a certain indecorousness in 
permitting my fancy to make the necessary changes. I had to 
content myself, therefore, with things as they were; with the 
teuf-teuf of the automobile instead of the wild wailing of white- 
robed Druids, and with the coming and going of modern car- 
riages under the shadowy branches, instead of strange chariots 
of bygone kings. 

After all, we did not find fairy-land but merely villa-land, 
when we flashed out from the mysterious heart of the forest; 
but the villas were charming, scattered in the woods, ringed 
with flowery lawns, and not one without a huge veranda like 
a garden-room, fitted up with so many cushioned sofas, easy- 
chairs, and little tables, that it was clear the family life was 
lived there. 

“I do hope my Dutch cousin’s house at Scheveningen is as 
pretty as these,” I said to myself. “It would be delicious to 
visit in a garden-room”; but presently we slipped out of the 
shade into sunlight, and were in a town of brick streets, huge 
hotels, with flags all a-flutter in a spanking, salt-smelling 
breeze, gay little shops and houses such as grow up by the sea. 
It was Scheveningen. 

I blinked in the blaze of sunlight which tore open the 
green veil of dusk, and the air, though tingling with ozone, felt 
hot after the depths of the forest. 

Not a flower, not a garden was to be seen, yet Scheveningen 
was a flower-garden of color in itself. Where the color came 
from you could scarcely say, yet it struck at your eyes from all 
directions. Flags flamed, roofs were red as beds of geraniums; 
or else they were green, or else they were vivid yellow. The 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 61 
hotels were of quaint design, with a suggestion of the Oriental ; 
the shops had covered galleries, and the people moving in the 
big, circular 'place into which we drove — - the place of the 
Kurhaus and of the circus — were drifting particles of the 
bright mosaic; tall, dark young officers (not at all typically 
Dutch according to preconceived ideas) in green and crimson 
or bright blue uniforms; pretty girls in white with rose-trim- 
med or scarlet hats; nursemaids in the costume of some remote 
province, the sunlight setting their gold head-ornaments on 
fire; tiny children in blue sailor-suits, or with a little red fez on 
a yellow head; old, white-haired gentlemen holding on un- 
suitable top-hats as they walked against the wind; white- 
aproned waiters flitting about restaurant verandas, carrying 
pink ices, or baskets of fruit, like jewels. 

It was a gay scene, but Robert said it was nothing to the 
“high season,” which began on the first of August, and brought 
throngs of fashionable people from all over Europe. As for the 
top-hats at which I laughed, he defended them stoutly, saying 
they were as much de rigueur at The Hague as in London, and 
he could see nothing comic in wearing them at the seaside. 

Still we had had no glimpse of the sea; but Robert turned 
the car, and driving between two gigantic hotels, ran down to 
a beach with sands of gleaming gold, and a background of 
wind-blown dunes billowing away as far as the eye could 
reach. The very wildness of this background gave a bizarre 
sort of charm to the fantastic buildings which made up the 
fashionable center of Scheveningen. 

In the center, the Kurhaus dominated all; hotel, restaurant, 
concert-room, theater, in one. Terrace below terrace it de- 
scended and sent out into the green water of the North Sea 
a great pier blossoming with flags. But the most individual 
feature was the large and enterprising family of “wind stoels” 
— dear, cozy basket-houses for one, like green and yellow bee- 
hives cut in half, or giant sunbonnets crowding the beach 


62 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

behind the bathing-machines. There one could nestle, self- 
contained as a hermit-crab in a shell, defying east wind or 
baking sun, happy with a book, or the person one liked best in 
a twin wind-stoel opposite. 

Reposeful gaiety seemed at this first glance to be the note 
struck by Scheveningen, and the air was buoyant as I had 
never known air to be before. 

“If you visit us in August,” said Robert, “you will hear the 
best operas, see the best automobile races, the most exciting 
motor-boat races ” 

“But we shall be on our own motor-boat in August,” said I. 

“I do not think so. You will perhaps let your boat. We 
will talk to my mother,” Robert answered, as one soothes a 
fractious child. Then, before I had breath to answer, he swept 
us away from the beach, and drew up before an aggressively 
comfortable villa on a terrace opening to the sea. 


VI 


T HERE was a garden-room with flower-painted walls, 
and Japanese furniture and silk things; and in the 
garden-room stood Cousin Robert’s mother. The 
great glass doors were wide open, and she moved 
slowly to the threshold to meet us. 

Yes, she is far too large to come and call upon a stranger; 
far, far too large for the motor- boat. 

I saw in a flash why Robert put the family dinner-hour be- 
fore the most important historical events which helped to make 
Holland. If his jaw is square enough, his gray eyes piercing 
enough to make his mother feel it convenient to entertain 
unknown guests, whatever her plans and inclinations, there’s 
no doubt that her personality is more than commanding 
enough to exact respect for domestic arrangements. 

It would need such a giant as Robert not to be overawed 
by her, outside domestic matters; and as for myself, though 
her pretty, smooth gray hair parts in the middle, and her 
cheeks grew as pink as a baby’s when she smiled and told me 
in nice English to call her “Cousin Cornelia,” I knew that if 
she said black were white I would instantly agree with her. 

There are glass doors between the garden-room and a 
drawing-room behind. They were closed, because the Dutch 
(I am already learning) like to draw a firm dividing line 
between being in the house and in the open air; and I could 
see through the glass a half-length, life-size portrait of a 
humorous little brown gentleman, who was, no doubt, Cousin 
Cornelia’s late husband, and Robert’s father. Taking this for 
granted, it’s evident that Robert gets his inches and his blond 

63 


64 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

splendor of looks from his mother. There was so much of 
Cousin Cornelia in her black and white spotted muslin, that at 
first I was conscious of her presence alone. It was only her 
rich voice (like Devonshire cream, all in soft lumps when the 
English words were difficult) introducing “Freule Menela van 
der Windt, and your two cousins, Lisbeth and Lilli,” which 
made me aware that others were present. 

I turned to the fiancee first, and found her a dark, thin, near- 
sighted girl, with eye-glasses that pinched her nose, and per- 
haps her temper as well, for there isn’t a line of her face which 
won’t be cross-grained when she is old. She looked hard 
through her glasses at me and at Phil, taking stock of us both, 
and didn’t offer to shake hands; but Lisbeth and Lilli, ador- 
able strawberry -and-cream girls, twins of fifteen or sixteen, 
put out dimpled fingers. 

. Cousin Cornelia asked how we liked Holland, but without 
waiting for us to answer, told off Lisbeth and Lilli to show us 
our room, as there was only just time to wash away the dust of 
motoring. 

I was awestruck by Cousin Cornelia, and depressed by 
Menela; still I hugged the thought that we were in luck to 
see the inside of a Dutch home, and determined to make the 
most of our experience, which may not occur again. 

I never supposed it possible for the interior of a house to 
shine as this does. Everything shines, even things that no one 
expects to present a polished surface. For instance, does any- 
body (not Dutch) call upon walls to behave as if they were 
mirrors ? Yet as I went up the rather steep stairs of the Villa 
van Buren I could see each movement I made, each rise and 
fall of an eyelash repeated on a surface of brilliantly varnished 
walnut. 

“What wonderful wood !” I exclaimed. 

“It is not real. It is paint,” said pretty Lisbeth. “Do you 
not have walls like this ?” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 65 

“Never,” I replied. 

“Every one does in Holland. We admire them,” explained 
Lilli. 

“But what a lot of work to keep them so bright.” 

“It is only done once a day,” she said apologetically. “The 
servant does it when she has finished the windows. ” 

“What — all the windows in the house — every day ?” 

“How else would they be clean ?” asked Lisbeth, surprised. 

There was no answer to this, from a Dutch point of view, so 
I remarked meekly that it must take all the servant’s time. 

“It is what they like,” said Lilli. “But we have another 
woman for the floors and beating out the rugs, and doing the 
brass, so it is not so much.” 

“Floors and rugs and brass every day, too ?” 

“Of course,” returned both girls together, as if I had asked 
them about their baths or their tooth-brushes. “Of course.” 

Lisbeth opened the door of a front room on the second 
floor. 

“This is the spare room,” said she, and advanced cautiously 
through the dusk caused by the closing of the shutters.“We 
keep them so in the afternoon,” she explained, “because of the 
sunshine* ” 

“Yes, otherwise the room would be hot, I suppose ?” 

“We do not mind its being hot. It is because the sun would 
fade the carpet and the curtains. ” She threw open the blinds 
as she spoke, but carefully shut both windows again. 

“Oh, mayn’t we have them open ?” I ventured to ask. “The 
air is lovely. ” 

“If you like,” my cousin replied. “Only, if you do, the sand 
may blow in.” 

“Just at the top then.” 

“At the top ? I have not seen a window that opens at the 
top. We do not have them made so.” 

“How funny! But I suppose there must be a reason why 


66 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

a whole nation should go on having windows that won’t open 
at the top.” 

“I do not know, except that we have always had them like 
that, so probably it is better to go on,” said Lilli, after a few 
seconds’ reflection, during which she looked exceedingly 
charming. She and Lisbeth made no attempt at having figures, 
but their faces are perfect, and their long tails of hair are fair 
and glossy as the silk of American corn. 

When the twins left us to our own devices, I was for simply 
washing hands and faces ; but Phil fiercely tore off her blouse, 
and made herself pink with the effort of unearthing another 
from our box. 

“What does it matter about changing ?” I asked. “There’s 
no time, and they don’t expect it. Besides, our things are as 
good as theirs — except Miss van der Windt’s. She's very 
smart — to make up for her plainness.” 

“That’s just the point,” said Phil, struggling into a white, 
medallioned blouse that fastened as intricately as the working 
of a prize puzzle. “I’ve taken such a dislike to her, and she 
to us.” 

“How do you know ?” 

“I can’t tell how. But I do know. And I want our frocks to 
be prettier than hers. Do change, like a pet. I’ll hook you up, if 
you’ll do me. Come, you might. You would bring me abroad.” 

“Oh, all right!” 

So I changed. And by dint of supernatural speed we were 
ready to leave our green-and-pink doll’s bedroom just as a 
Japanese gong moaned an apology for supplying us with din- 
ner instead of tea. 

Once in a “blue moon” Phil and I are invited by some one 
to dine at the Carlton or the Savoy, or at houses where the 
dinners are long and elaborate; but memories of those dinners 
pale before the reality of this at the Villa van Buren, in a 
handsome, shut-up dining-room. 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 67 

There were hors cT oeuvres, and shell fish, and soup, and 
another kind of fish ; and alter that began a long procession of 
meat and birds, cooked in delicious, rich sauces. There were 
so many that I lost count, as Noah must when he stood at the 
ark door to receive the animals as they came along, two by 
two; but these were a little easier to keep track of, because you 
could remind yourself by saying: “That was the one done up 
in currant juice; that was the one with compote of cherries,” 
and so on; which, of course, Noah couldn’t. 

Phil’s capacity and mine was exhausted comparatively early 
in the feast, but everybody else was eating steadily on, so we 
dared not refuse a course, lest it should be considered rude in 
Holland. We did our best, straight through to a wonderful iced 
pudding, and managed a crumb of spiced cheese; but when 
raw currants appeared, we had to draw the line. The others 
called them “bessen,” pulling the red beads off their stems with 
a fork, and sprinkling them with sugar, but my blood curdled 
at the sight of this dreadful fruit, and my mouth crinkled up 
inside. 

Although we sat down at six, it was after eight when we 
rose, and as the windows were shut, the room w T as suffocating. 
Everybody looked flushed, and I dared not hope, after exclud- 
ing the air for so long, that we should be allowed a breath of it 
later. But Cousin Cornelia, as a matter of course, led the way 
into the garden-room, where lamps, shaded with rose-colored 
silk, had now been lighted on two of the book- and magazine- 
strewn tables. 

The strong air of the sea blew blessedly upon us, seeming 
cold after the heat of the dining-room, but Cousin Cornelia 
did not even wrap a shawl about her shoulders. We were 
out-of-doors now, and it was right to have air, so you took it 
for granted, and did not suffer. But indoors, what were 
windows for if you did not keep them closed ? It seemed 
a waste of good material, and therefore a tempting of 


68 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Providence to take revenge by sending you bronchitis or 

rheumatism. 

It was exquisite in the garden-room. Sea and sky mingled 
in a haze of tender blue. All the air was blue, spangled with 
the lights of the pier; and our lamps, and the shaded lamps 
of other garden-rooms, glowed in the azure dusk like burning 
flowers, roses, and daffodils, and tulips. 

We had coffee in cups small and delicate as egg-shells, and 
the old silver spoons were spoons for dolls or fairies. 

Robert asked if we would like to go to the circus, which 
could not, he said, be surpassed in Europe; or to a classical 
concert at the Kurhaus : but we were contented in the garden- 
room, with the music of the sea. We talked of many things, 
and if Robert is deficient in a knowledge of history, the others 
make up for his ignorance. They know something of every- 
thing; and even the apple-blossom twins could put Phyllis 
and me to shame, if they were not too polite, on the subject of 
modern musicians and painters. 

They speak French, German, and Italian, as well as Eng- 
lish: a smattering of Spanish too; yet they said modestly, when 
we exclaimed at their accomplishments, that it was nothing; 
hardly anybody would learn Dutch, so the Dutch must learn 
the languages of other nations. 

As for Freule Menela (I must not call her “Miss,” it seems, 
because “Freule” is a kind of title) she is the cleverest of all, 
as the sweet twins tried to make us understand; and the pretty 
creatures are proud of her, thinking little of their own beauty. 
Sometimes I fancied that a shade of contempt passed over her 
face when Robert ventured a remark which showed him more 
accomplished as sportsman than scholar; but, if she noticed 
that he turned to Phil or me with any brightening of interest, 
she at once took pains to engage his attention. 

They talked in low, pleasant voices, scarcely raising their 
tones or making a gesture; and there was always that faint 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW C9 
suggestion of the Scotch accent, whether they spoke English 
or broke into Dutch. When I remarked upon it. Cousin Cor- 
nelia laughed and said it was perhaps the common Celtic 
ancestry; and that if the Dutch heard Gaelic talked, they 
could recognize a few words here and there. 

It was not more than an hour after we finished our coffee, 
that tea was brought, with more beautiful china, and a great 
deal of handsome silver. What with this potent mixture of 
stimulants, and being in a new house, and thinking exciting 
thoughts of the future, I felt I shouldn’t be able to sleep. 
Nevertheless, after we’d said good-night, and Phil and I were 
undressing, I was not pleased when Cousin Cornelia knocked 
at the door. 

“She has come about the motor-boat,” I thought, “to tell 
us we oughtn’t to go. Heaven grant me strength to resist.” 
For in her quilted Japanese silk dressing-gown she looked 
larger and more formidable than ever. 

Not a word did she say about the motor-boat at first. It 
was our past which seemed to interest her, not our future. As 
a relation she has the right to ask me things about myself, and 
Phil’s history is inextricably tangled up with mine. 

She wanted to know where we lived in London, and how: 
also on what, though she didn’t put it as crudely as that. I 
was frank, and told her about my serial stories and Phil’s 
typing. 

“I suppose you think we’re mad to break up our work and 
go on a motor-boat tour in Holland, as if we were millionaires, 
when really we’re poor girls,” I said, before she had time to 
reprove us. “But we have each about a hundred and twenty 
pounds a year, whatever happens, so it isn’t as desperate as 
you might think. Besides, it is going to be the time of our 
lives. Even my stepsister feels so now, though she was against 
it at first, and neither of us would give it up for anything. ” 

“I don’t think you should give it up,” said Cousin Cornelia. 


70 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

You might have knocked me down with a feather — quite a 
small one: for in her note she had said we must come and let 
her offer us good advice before it was too late; and Robert 
had hinted that his mother meant to dissuade us from our 
wild-goose chase — in the company of Mr. Starr and Mr. 
Starr’s aunt. 

“I think you know how to take care of yourselves,” she 
went on. 

“And we’ll have a chaperon,” Phil assured her. 

“So I have heard, from my son. I have great faith in the 
Scotch. Yes, as you have been a little too kind-hearted, and 
promised this strange young man, it is necessary that some- 
body should have an aunt. Otherwise, if you two had been 
quite alone together, it would not so much have mattered. In 
Holland girls have liberty, more than anywhere except in Ame- 
rica. The bicycle is their chaperon, for all young girls and 
men bicycle with us. The motor-boat might have been your 
chaperon. Even if the aunt should not come, perhaps the 
nephew could be got rid of, and a way arranged, rather than 
give up your tour.” 

We were delighted, and I could have hugged Cousin Cor- 
nelia. Indeed, I did thank her warmly, and. was rather sur- 
prised that Phil, who usually overflows with gratitude for the 
slightest kindness, was not more effusive over my relative’s 
interest in our affairs, and her broad-minded verdict. 

“She’s a lamb, after all, isn’t she ?” I asked, when the large 
lady had gone, and I was ready to creep into a bed only an 
inch too short for me. 

“She may be a lamb, but she isn’t going to let us shear her, 
if she can help it,” said Phil, looking deadly wise. 

“What do you mean ?” 

“My dear girl, with all your cleverness, you’re only a baby 
child about some things. Don't you see what’s she’s driving 
at?” 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 71 

I shook my head, with my hair about my face. 

“Or what all her questions were leading up to ? Well, then, 
what do you think has made her change her mind about our 
motor-boating ?” 

“She saw we could take care of ourselves.” 

“She has found out that we’re poor, and obliged to. She 
supposed from what your cousin Robert told her, that we were 
heiresses ; and she would have kept us on a long visit if — oh, 
you silly old dear, don’t you see she’s afraid of us — with him ? 
She’ll be polite and nice, but she wants us to disappear.” 

“Good gracious!” 

“Pretty Lilli told me this evening that Freule Menela van 
der Windt hasn’t much money, but she comes of a splendid 
family : she’s a distant relation of that Mr. Brederode, and her 
people are diplomats who live at The Hague, though she’s an 
orphan and visits about. If one of us were rich - — why — oh, 
it’s too horrid to go on. Now, maybe, you understand what I 
mean, and can put two and two together and agree with me.” 

“For a saint, you sometimes develop a hideous amount of 
worldly wisdom, my Phil,” I replied. “But when I come to 
think Cousin Cornelia over, I’m afraid you’re right. It would 
be fun to flirt with Robert, and frighten her, wouldn’t it ?” 

“We are going away — to the motor-boat — to-morrow, 
and we shall never see him again,” said Phil. “Besides, it’s 
wrong to flirt, even with foreigners; and now do let me say my 
prayers.” 


VII 


"TEXT morning, when I waked up, and cautiously 
drew my watch from under the pillow, not to dis- 
^ turb Phyllis, it was only six o’clock, and there was 
Phil gazing at me, with eyes large and bright in the 
green dusk that filtered through the olive curtains. 

“I’ve been awake for ages,” said she. 

“What are you thinking about ?” 

“The motor-boat. Queer — but I can’t help it.” 

“Neither can I. Can you go to sleep again ?” 

“No. Can you ?” 

“Not I. Let’s get up, and creep out of doors. What fun to 
go down to the beach and take a bath !” 

“Nell ! In our nighties ?” 

“Silly! We’ll hire things — and bathing-machines.” 

After mature deliberation Phil decided not to risk being 
taken for a thief by the van Buren family; but I could not 
abandon the idea, and fifteen minutes later I was softly un- 
locking the front door, to steal alone into the pearly, new-born 
day. Oh, the wonder of it — the wonder of each new day, if 
one only stopped to think; but the wonder of this above all 
others ! 

Already there were a few people about, hurrying beachward ; 
and when I reached the level of the firm, yellow sand, there 
were the red-trousered men of the bathing-machines, in full 
activity, getting their horses into the traces, while dogs raced 
wildly over sand-hillocks, and children played with bright, 
sea- washed shells the waves had flung them. 

Two or three of the bath-machines were in use, some were 
72 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 73 
engaged for persons not yet arrived, and I thought myself 
lucky in securing one drawn by the handsomest horse of all. 
The others were dull, fr/ase-looking creatures compared to 
him; indeed, he was far too fine for a mere bathing-machine, 
and had a lovely cushiony back like the animals on which 
beautiful ladies pirouet in circuses. I longed to try it myself, 
when my shoes and stockings were off. 

Just as I had got into the prickly blue serge costume pro- 
vided by the “management,” I heard the sound of stirring 
military music, played not far away by a brass band, and 
something queer happened at the same moment. The machine 
began to rock as if there were an earthquake, to dart forward, 
to retreat, and at last to go galloping ahead at a speed to 
suggest that in a sudden fit of hallucination it had persuaded 
itself it was a motor-car. 

“That horse !” I gasped, and swaying first against one wall, 
then against the other, scarcely able to keep my feet, I tore 
the door open and peeped out. 

If I had not been frightened I should have laughed, for it 
was plain to see from the expression of that cushiony back, 
that the animal was merely pretending to be afraid of the 
music, in a kittenish wish for a little early morning fun. But 
he was also pretending in quite a life-like manner to run away, 
and the thought occurred to me that the consequences might 
be as awkward for the occupant of the machine as if the jest 
were earnest. 

“Whoa, whoa,” cried a voice in pursuit, and splash! went 
the beast into the surf. He was playing that he was a sea- 
horse, now, and enjoying it selfishly, without a thought of poor 
me in the horrid, tottery little box that would be knocked over 
by a big wave, maybe, in another instant, in a welter of sand 
and salt water, under a merry horse’s hoofs. 

I clung to the door with one hand, and the frame with 
the other, swinging back and forth on the threshold, with 


74 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

abnormally large iron shoes flying up and down in the wet 
green foreground, and the whole North Sea towering over 
me in the middle distance — oh, but a very near middle 
distance ! 

I wavered in mind as well as body. If I didn’t jump out — 
now, this minute — I might be caught and pinned like a 
mouse in a trap, under the water. If I did jump, the horse 
would kick me, and the wheels of the machine would go over 
me, and I should be battered as well as drowned before any- 
body could fish me out. I did feel horribly alone in the world, 
and the waves looked as tall as transparent green skyscrapers. 

“One, two; at three I’ll jump,” I was saying resolutely, 
between chattering teeth, when a head came toward me in 
the sea. It came on top of a wave, and like the dear little 
cut-off cherubs in old-fashioned prayer-books, it seemed to 
have no body, yet I recognized it, and felt half inclined to 
bow (salutation, O Caesar, from one about to die!) only it 
would have seemed ridiculous to bow to a mere passing head, 
when one was on the eve of being swept away by the North 
Sea. Phyllis might have done it. I gave a short shriek, and 
then it appeared that the head had full control of the wave, 
for it stopped and let the wave rush by, to show that it had a 
tall, brown, dripping body, sketchily clad in the kind of thing 
that men dare to call a bathing-suit. 

It did not seem strange at the time that William the Silent 
should be shot from a wave as if by a catapult, and still less 
strange that without a word he should seize my horse by the 
head and stop him. It seemed the sort of thing that ought 
to happen to foreigners traveling in Holland, if in need of 
succor. 

“Oh, thank you so much!” I heard myself saying, just as 
if he had had on a frock-coat and top-hat, and had stopped a 
hansom cab for me in Bond Street. 

“Not at all,” I heard him reply, in the same London-in- 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 75 
the-season tone Then suddenly I thought of Stanley in the 
desert saying, “Dr. Livingstone, I believe ?” and my bare feet, 
and his dripping hair, and the whole scene struck me so 
quaintly that I laughed out aloud ; whereupon he smiled a wet, 
brown smile, showing white teeth. 

“I’m not having hysterics,” I spluttered, with my mouth full 
of spray. “It’s only — only — ” and the spray choked me with 
its salt. 

“Of course,” said William the Silent, grave again, and so 
like the portrait that I felt I must be a historical character, 
acting with him in an incident forgotten or expurgated by 
Motley. “I’m so glad I came. I saw you from further out, and 
thought something was wrong. But it’s all right now.” 

“Yes, thank you,” I said meekly. “Why, you’re an English- 
man , aren’t you ?” 

“Dutch to the backbone,” he answered; and then, suddenly 
conscious, perhaps, that the (might one call it “feature” ?) he 
had mentioned, was too much exposed to be discussed thus 
lightly, he changed the subject. 

“Here’s your man,” he said quickly, and forthwith fell to 
scolding in vehement Dutch the unfortunate wretch who had 
waded to the rescue. The horse, made sadder if not wiser by 
blows from his master, allowed himself to be backed for a 
certain distance, until it was safe for me to descend and take 
my postponed bath. I had but time to bow and murmur more 
inane thanks, to receive another bow and polite murmur in 
return (both murmurs being drowned by the sea) when the 
retrograde movement of the bathing-machine parted me and 
my living life-preserver. He stood in the water looking after 
us long enough to see that there would be no further incidents, 
then took a header into the waves again. 

I’m not sure that my adventure did not add spice to the 
salt of my bath. Anyhow, it was glorious, and I ran back to 
the villa at last tingling with joy of life, in time to be let in by 


76 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

a maid who was cleaning the door-steps. It was half-past 
seven, and breakfast was at eight. I had to make haste with 
my toilet, but luckily there are few tasks which can’t be accom- 
panied by a running fire of chat (that is, if one is a wotnan) so 
I had told everything to Phyllis by the time I had begun 
fastening the white serge frock in which I was to go to The 
Hague and the Concours Hippique. Just then the Japanese 
gong sent forth its melancholy wail, so we hurried down, and 
I forgot to tell Phyllis not to mention the incident. I didn’t 
think it the kind of incident which would be approved by the 
van Buren family, and on second thoughts I didn’t approve of 
it myself. 

Hardly were we comfortably seated at the table, however, 
when Phil told Robert what a part his friend had played in 
my adventure. I could not stop her, and when I was called 
upon for details, gave them rather than seem to be secretive. 

“We must be thankful that Brederode was taking his dip 
early,” said Robert. “I will tell him this afternoon that we are 
very grateful for what he did.” 

I blushed consciously. “Oh, must you ?” I asked. “Some- 
how, I’ve an idea he’ll think it stupid of me to have mentioned 
it. Besides, maybe it wasn't your friend. Perhaps it was some 
one who looked like him. The — er — dress was so different, 
and I had hardly seen Mr. Brederode ” 

“Jonkheer Brederode,” corrected Freule Menela, softly. 

I broke out laughing. “Jonkheer*! Oh, do forgive me, but it 
sounds so funny. I really never could call a person Jonkheer, 
and take him seriously 

“You will have to call him Jonkheer when I bring him to 
the box, after he has finished his part in the Concours Hippi - 
que ,” said Robert. “There is no one who looks like Rudolph 
Brederode, so it must have been he. You can see this after- 
noon.” 

“But I don’t want to see,” I objected, crossly, for I felt I 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 77 
could not solemnly and adequately thank the young man 
before my listening relatives, for popping out of the sea in his 
microscopic costume, and coming to the rescue of me in mine. 
I had squeaked and curled up my toes, and been altogether 
ridiculous; and I knew we should at best burst out laughing 
in each other’s faces — which would astonish the van Buren 

“Whoever he was, I thanked him three times this morning, 
and that’s enough,” I went on. “He wasn’t risking his life, 
you know, and really and truly, I’d rather not meet him for- 
mally, if you don’t mind.” 

“Very well,” said Cousin Robert, looking offended, and 
turning his attention to breakfast. 

It was, when I came to notice it, the oddest breakfast 
imaginable, yet it had a tempting air. There was a tiny glass 
vase of flowers at each person’s place, and the middle of the 
table was occupied by a china hen sitting on her nest. The 
eggs which she protected were hard-boiled; and ranged round 
,the nest were platters of every kind of cold smoked meat, and 
cold smoked fish, dreamed of in the philosophy of cooks. 
There was also cold ham; and there were crisp, rich little 
rusks, and gingerbread in Japanese tin boxes, to eat with 
honey in an open glass dish, and there was coffee fit for gods 
and goddesses. Even Phil drank it, though she was offered tea, 
excusing her treachery by saying that she found her tastes 
were changing to suit the climate of Holland — a dangerous 
theory, since who can tell to what wild lengths it may lead ? 

When we had finished, the coffee-tray was taken from its 
place in front of Cousin Cornelia, and another tray, bearing 
two large china bowls of hot water, a dish with soap, a toy mop 
with a carved wood handle, and two towels, was substituted 
for it. 

“I wash the fine china and the coffee-spoons myself, after 
breakfast,” explained Cousin Cornelia, slipping off her rings, 


78 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

and beginning her pretty task. “The best of servants are not 

as careful as their mistresses, and it is a custom in Holland.” 

“But you didn’t wash the coffee- and tea-cups last night 
after dinner,” I reminded her. 

“No,” she replied, “I never do that.” 

“But isn’t the china as valuable, and isn’t there as much 1 
danger of it’s being broken ?” 

She looked puzzled, almost distressed. “Yes, that is true,” 
she admitted, “but — it is not a custom. I don’t know why, 
but it never has been.” 

Her housewifely pleasure was spoiled for the moment, and 
I wished that I hadn’t spoken. 

After all, Lisbeth and Lilli were not to go with us to The 
Hague. This was the morning for opening the curio cabinets 
in the drawing-room, and washing the contents, and the girls 
were expected to help their mother. As the glass doors are 
never opened, unless that some guest may carefully handle a 
gold snuff-box, a miniature, or a bit of old Delft, the things 
could scarcely need washing; but the rule is to have them out 
once a month, and it would be a crime to break it. This Freule 
Menela explained in a low voice, and with the suspicion of a 
smile, as if she wished the two girls from London to under- 
stand that she was able to see the humorous side of these 
things. 

“Your cousins are old-fashioned,” she went on, “though 
dear people; I’ve known them since I was a child, and am 
fond of them for their own sakes as well as Robert’s. You 
must not think that everybody in our country dines at five. 
For instance, if you visited in my set at The Hague, you would 
find things more as they are in France. When Robert and I 
are married I shall manage the house.” 

We listened civilly, but liked her none the better for her 
disavowal of van Buren ways. 

“Horrid, snobbish, disloyal little wretch,” said Phil, after- 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 79 
wards, quite viciously. “Your cousin’s a hundred times too 
good and too good-looking for her; but she doesn’t know that. 
She fancies herself superior, and thinks she’s condescending to 
ally herself with the family. I do believe she’s marrying your 
cousin for his money, and if she could get a chance to do 
better according to her ideas, she’d throw him over.” 

“It isn’t likely she’ll ever have another chance of any sort,” 
said I; “Robert won’t get rid of his bargain easily.” 

“She’s going with us this morning, and makes a favor of 
it,” went on Phil. “She says she’s tired to death of the pictures; 
but I’m sure ten wild horses wouldn’t keep her at home.” 

Be that as it may, the power of twenty wild horses in motor 
form rushed her away in our society and that of her fiance. 

In the beautiful forest, which I was happy in seeing again, 
we threaded intricate, dark avenues, and came at last (as if we 
had been a whole party of tourist princes in the tale of the 
“Sleeping Beauty”) to the House in the Wood. 

The romance of the place grew in my eyes, because a 
princess built it to please her husband, and because the 
husband was that son of William the Silent who best carried 
on his father’s plans for Holland’s greatness. I’m afraid I 
cared more about it for the sake of Princess Amalia and 
Frederic Henry of Orange, than for the sake of the Peace 
Conference, because the Conference was modern; and it was 
of the princess I thought as we passed through room after 
room of the charming old house, hidden in the very heart of 
the forest. Had she commanded the exquisite Chinese em- 
broideries, the wonderful decorations from China and Japan, 
and the lovely old china ? I wouldn’t ask, for if she had had 
nothing to do with that part, I didn’t wish to know. 

In the octagonal Orange Salon where the twenty-six Powers 
met to make peace, and where the walls and cupola are a riot 
of paintings in praise of Frederic Henry and his relations, we 
strained our necks to see the pictures, and our brains to recall 


80 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

who the people were and what they had done; but even the 

portrait of Motley, which we’d just passed, and the knowledge 

that he wrote in this very house did not always prod our 

memories. 

Robert would not let us stay long at the House in the Wood. 
He took us to see the site of the Palace of Peace, which Mr. 
Carnegie’s money and a little of other people’s will build, and 
then flashed us on to The Hague in time to reach the Maurit- 
shuis as it opened. 

Robert didn’t pretend to know much about the pictures, 
though he was patriotically proud of them, as among the best 
to be found, if you searched the world. But the fiancee was in 
her element. “Tired to death ” of these splendid things she 
might be, in her small soul, but she was determined to impress 
us with her artistic knowledge. 

“I know exactly where all the best pictures are,” she said, 
motioning away the official guides, “and I will take you to 
them.” 

She had a practical, energetic air, and her black eyes were 
sharp behind her pince-nez. I felt I could not be introduced 
by her to the glorious company of great men, and basely I 
slipped away from the party, leaving Phil to follow with out- 
ward humility and inward rebellion — a martyr to politeness. 

Oh, how glad I was to be left alone with the pictures, with 
nobody to tell me anything about them! I flew back to buy 
a catalogue, and then, carefully dodging my friends, whose 
backs I spied from time to time, I gave myself up to happiness. 

I didn’t want to see the Madonnas and nymphs and god- 
desses, and Italian scenes, which a certain school conscien- 
tiously produced, because in their day it was the fashion. I 
wanted only the characteristically Dutch artists, the men who 
loved their dear Hollow Land, putting her beyond all, glorify- 
ing her, and painting what they knew with their hearts as well 
as eyes — the daily life of home; the rich brown dusk of 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 81 
humble rooms; the sea, the sky, the gentle, flat landscape, the 
pleasant domestic animals. 

My acquaintance with Dutch art was made in London at 
the National Gallery; now I wanted to see it at home, and 
understand it as one can best understand it here. 

I soon found the great Rembrandt — “the School of Anat- 
omy,” and stood for a long time looking at the wonderful 
faces — faces in whose eyes each thought lay clear to read. 
What a picture! A man who had done nothing else all his 
life long but paint just that, would have earned the right to be 
immortal; but to have been only twenty-six when he did it, 
and then to have gone on, through year after year, giving the 
world masterpieces, and to be repaid by that world in the end 
with poverty and hardship! My cheeks burned as I stood 
thinking of it, and somehow I felt guilty and responsible, as if 
I’d lived in Rembrandt’s day, and been as ungrateful as the 
others. 

I had expected to be disappointed in Paul Potter’s “Bull,” 
because people always speak of it at once, if they hear you 
are going to Holland; but if you could be disappointed in 
that young and winning beast w T ho kindly stands there with 
diamonds in his great velvet eyes, and the breath coming and 
going under his rough, wholesome coat for you to look at and 
admire, when all the time you know that he could kill you if 
he liked, why, you would deserve to be gored by him and 
trodden by his companions. 

How I wanted to have known Jan van Steen, and thanked 
him for his glorious, rollicking, extraordinary pictures (especi- 
ally for “The Poultry Yard”), and have slyly stolen his bottle 
away from him sometimes, so that he might have painted even 
more, and not have come to ruin in the end! How I loved 
the gentle Van Ruysdaels* and how pathetic the everlasting 
white horse got to seem, after I had seen him repeated again 
and again in every sort of tender or eccentric landscape ! Poor, 


82 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

tired white horse! I thought he must have been as weary ol 

his journeyings as the Wandering Jew. 

There are two Rubens in the Mauritshuis which intoxicated 
me, as if I’d been drinking new red wine; and there is one 
little Gerard Douw, above all other Gerard Douws, worth a 
three-days’ journey on foot to see. In a window of the Bull’s 
room I found it; and I stood so long staring, that at last I 
began to be afraid the others might have gone away. They 
came upon me, though, all too soon, and exclaimed, “Why, 
where have you been ?” and “We’ve been looking for you 
everywhere.” I said I was sorry, and wondered how I had 
been so stupid as to miss them. Then we were marshalled 
away by Robert for luncheon, as we’d been three hours in the 
Mauritshuis, and before long we must be driving to the Con - 
cours Hippique. 

Only three hours in some of the best society on earth, and 
I shall be expected to tell about my impressions when I go 
back to England ! I know well that I can tell nothing worth 
telling; and yet, even in this short time, I feel that I under- 
stand more about Holland and the Hollanders than I could 
have come to understand, except through their pictures — 
more even than Motley could have told me. 

I said to myself as I went away from the galleries, that 
Dutch painting would stand for me henceforth as an epitome 
of the Dutch people. No one but the Dutch could have painted 
pictures like theirs — so quaint, so painstaking, and at the 
same time so splendid. Their love of rich brown shadow and 
amber light was learned in the dim little rooms of their own 
homes, and of inns where the brass and pewter gleamed in 
the mellow dusk of raftered kitchens, and piles of fruit and 
vegetables fell like jewels, from paniers such as Gerard Douw 
took three days to paint on a scale of three inches. 

We had a hasty luncheon at a nice hotel with an air of 
Parisian gaiety about it, and sped away in the motor to the 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 83 
Horse Show, which was to be held in a park between The 
Hague and Scheveningen. It was advertised on every wall 
and hoarding, even on lamp-posts, and Freule Menela 
(gorgeous in a Paris frock and tilted hat) prophesied that, 
as the Queen and Prince Consort were honoring the occasion, 
we should see the loveliest women, handsomest men, and 
prettiest dresses, as well as the best horses that Holland could 
produce. 

“When I say Holland, I mean The Hague; it is the same 
thing,” she added, with a conceited toss of the chin; and I 
thought she deserved shaking for her sly dig at Robert of 
Rotterdam, than whom there can be no handsomer young 
man in the Netherlands. 

Cousin Cornelia in filmy gray, and the twins radiant as 
fresh-plucked roses in their white frocks and Leghorn hats, 
had arrived, and were in one of the many long, open loggias 
close to the red-and-gold pavilion which was ready for the 
Royalties. 

Over the pavilion, with its gilded crown and crest, floated 
the orange flag as well as the tricolor of Holland; everywhere 
flags were waving and red bunting glowing, and there was far 
more effect of color than at an English race-meeting. Every 
box, every seat, was full; pretty hats nodded like flowers in 
a huge parterre swept by a breeze; smart-looking men with 
women in trailing white walked about the lawns; and Robert 
and Menela pointed out the celebrities — ambassadors and 
ambassadors’ wives, politicians, popular actresses, celebrated 
journalists, men of title or wealth who owned horses and gave 
their lives to sport. 

All the men of the haut mond were in frock-coats and tall 
hats, and most of them looked English. There were few of 
the type which I preconceived as Dutch, yet I saw faces in 
the crowd which Rembrandt or Rubens might have used as 
models; thin, dark faces; hard, shrewd faces, with long noses 


84 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

and pointed chins; good-natured round faces, with wide-open 
gray eyes; important, conceited faces like the burgomasters in 
ancient portraits. 

“Not a type has changed,” I said to myself. “These people 
of to-day are the same people who suffered torture smiling, 
who were silent on the rack, who drove the Spaniards out of 
their land, and swept the English from the seas.” 

This was my mood when a stir among the throng heralded 
the coming of the Queen, and I applauded as patriotically as 
a Dutchwoman the young daughter of the brave house of 
Orange and Nassau. 

She had a fine procession, and made an effective entrance 
through the wide gates that swung apart to let in her outriders 
in their green livery, and the royal coaches, with powdered 
coachmen and footmen in blazing red and gold. A charming 
young woman she looked, too, in her blowing white cloud of 
chiffon and lace, and ostrich-plumes. While she circled round 
the drive with her suite, I heard the Dutch National Hymn 
for the first time, and also a soft and plaintive air which is the 
Queen’s own — a kind of “entrance music” which follows her 
about through life, like the music for a leading actress on the 
stage. 

When the Queen in her white dress, the stout, bland Prince 
Consort in his blue uniform, and the ladies of the Court were 
settled under the crimson curtains of the pavilion, officers who 
were competing in the Horse Show — Hollanders in green and 
cerise, and plain blue; Belgians in blue and red; two or three 
Danes in delicious azure — were brought up with much cere- 
mony to be introduced. 

“There goes Rudolph Brederode,” said Robert, a light of 
friendly admiration kindling in his eyes for a tall, slim figure 
in black coat and riding-breeches. “See, her Majesty is wish- 
ing him good luck. He — ” But my cousin glanced at me, 
and remembering my base ingratitude, decided that I deserved 


NELL VAN BUREN’S POINT OF VIEW 85 
no further information about his hero, who ought to be my 
hero too. 

I pretended not to hear, and watched the show of beautiful 
horses and carriages. They went round and round the great 
grassy ring, each driver (and some of them were English) 
taking off their top-hats in front of the Royal Pavilion. 

There was a good deal of this kind of entertainment, but 
the best part of the show was saved for the last, when all the 
glittering carriages had disappeared from the course. Then 
came the jumping competition, in which the finest riders, 
officers and civilians, were to prove what they and their horses 
could do. 

The crowd had wearied of the long driving contests, but as 
the Dutch soldiers ran out across the grass to take their places 
beside the hedges, hurdles, water-jumps, and obstacles, there 
was a general brisking up. 

Then began the real excitement of the afternoon. People 
greeted their favorites with applause, and Cousin Robert’s 
hero had the largest share. He made a splendid figure on his 
delicately shaped roan, a creature all verve and muscle like 
his master, graceful as a cat, and shining in the sun with the 
rich effulgence of a chestnut fresh from the burr. 

I couldn’t help a jumping of the pulses when the bell rang, 
and the good-looking young men on their grand horses can- 
tered into the ring. Rudolph Brederode was the last, and his 
horse came in on its hind legs, pawing and prancing with 
sheer joy of life and its own beauty; yet what a different beast 
from that other who had also pirouetted to the sound of music 
in the morning ! I wondered if William the Silent thought — 
but of course he didn’t. 

One by one the horses started, urged on or held back by 
their riders. All rode well, but not one got round the course 
without a fault — a jump short at a ditch; a hind hoof that 
brushed a hedge; the ring of an iron shoe on a hurdle; or a 


86 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

wooden brick sent flying from the top row on a high wall; not 

one, until Rudolph Brederode’s turn came. 

At the last moment, a pat of his hand on his horse’s satin 
shoulder quieted the splendid creature’s nerves. Instantly it 
was calm, and coming down from fun to business, started off 
at the daintest of canters, which broke at exactly the right 
second into a noble bound. Without a visible effort the 
adorable beast rose for each obstacle, floating across hedges 
and walls as if it had been borne by the wings of Pegasus. 
The last, widest water- jump was taken with one long, flying 
leap; and then, doffing his hat low to the Royal Box, the con- 
queror rode away in a storm of applause. 

“It’s always like that. Brederode never fails in anything 
he undertakes,” said Robert, as happy as if he, and not his 
friend, had been the victor. “I’m off to congratulate him now.” 

Two minutes later I saw the hero among the crowd, his 
head towering above most other heads; then I lost sight of 
him, and turned again to watch the course, for the riding was 
not nearly finished yet. But with the triumph of the great 
Water Beggar’s descendant, the best was over. No one else 
did as well as he, or had as fine a horse, and I found myself 
looking for him and Robert. Maybe Robert would bring him 
to the box in spite of all. It was a pity the others should be 
cheated of a word with him — which even the twins seemed to 
hope for — just because Robert had to punish me. 

But he did not come, nor did Robert until after the Royal- 
ties had gone, and Cousin Cornelia was ready to go too. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 


VIII 

I DON’T often do things that I have set my mind against 
doing, but when Destiny lays a hand on one’s steering- 
gear, unexpected things happen. 

My idea has always been that, when my time came 
to fall seriously in love, the girl would be a Dutch girl. I like 
and respect Dutch girls. When you want them, there they are. 
There’s no nonsense in them — - at least, as little as possible, 
considering that they are females. They don’t fuss about 
their temperaments, and imagine themselves Mysteries, and 
Chameleons, and Anomalies, and make themselves and their 
lovers miserable by trying to be inscrutable. You can generally 
tell pretty well what they are going to do next, and if you don’t 
want them to, you can prevent them from doing it. Also they 
have good nerves and good complexions, and for these reasons, 
and many others, make perfect wives for men with family tradi- 
tions to keep up. That is why I always intended to fall seriously 
in love with a Dutch girl, although my mother was an Eng- 
lishwoman, and her father (an English earl who thought Eng- 
land the only land) made an American heiress his Countess. 

More than once I’ve come near to carrying out my in- 
tention, but the feeling I had, never seemed the right feeling, 
so I let the matter drop, and waited for next time. 

A few days ago, I found out that there would never be 
a next time. I knew this when Rob van Buren spoke of the 
two girls who were with him at the Prinzenhof on July tenth 
as his “American cousin and an English friend.” 

87 


88 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I can never fall in love with a Dutch girl now, for I have 
done the thing I did not mean to do, and it can’t be undone 
in this world. Once and for all, that is settled, however it 
may go with me where the girl is concerned. But it will go 
hard if I do not have her in the end, and I shall if she is to 
be got; for the men of my blood soon make up their minds 
when they want a thing, and they do not rest much until it’s 
theirs. This peculiarity has often landed them in trouble in 
past times, and may land me in trouble now; but I’m ready 
for the risk, as they were. 

I didn’t know at first which was the English girl — my girl 
with the chestnut hair, dark hazel eyes, and rose and white 
complexion ; or the other girl with brown hair, eyes of violet, 
and skin of cream. But when I encountered my girl in the 
sea at half-past six in the morning, unchaperoned except by 
a foolish runaway horse attached to a bathing-machine, I 
should have guessed that she was the American, even if there 
had been nothing in her pretty voice to suggest it. 

I am sorry that it couldn’t have been the other way round, 
for my English mother’s sake, since my fate isn’t to be Dutch. 
But it can’t be helped. I have seen The One Girl, and it 
would be the same if she were a Red Indian. 

I was going to lead up to the subject when van Buren 
came to speak to me at the Horse Show; but he began it, by 
thanking me, in the grave way he has, for coming to his 
cousin’s rescue in the morning. I shouldn’t have referred to 
that little business, as she might not have mentioned her 
adventure; but as she had told the story, it gave me a founda- 
tion to work on. 

I said truly that what I had done was nothing, but hinted 
that I should be pleased to meet the young lady again; and 
thereupon expected an invitation to visit his mother’s box. 
To my surprise, it didn’t come, and Robert’s face showed that 
there was a reason why. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 89 

“My cousin doesn’t deserve that you should take an interest 
in her,” he blurted out. “She is pretty, yes, and perhaps that 
is why she is so spoiled, for she is vain and capricious and 
flippant. I wish it were Miss Rivers who had our blood in her 
veins.” 

Queerly enough, instead of cooling me off toward the girl, 
Robert’s criticism of her had the opposite effect. I have liked 
Robert since I took him under my wing during my last and 
his first year at Leiden. Perhaps it tickles my vanity to know 
that he has been boyish enough to make me into a kind of 
hero, little though I deserve it, and whenever I have been able 
to do him a good turn I have done it ; but suddenly I found 
myself thinking him a young brute, and feeling that he de- 
served kicking. 

“I suppose Miss Van Buren hasn’t paid enough attention 
to your High Mightiness,” said I. 

“She hasn’t put herself out much,” said he; “but it isn’t 
that I care about, it’s her attitude toward you. Of course you 
couldn’t help hearing what she said yesterday at the Prinzen- 
hof about the portrait of William the Silent. Because I asked 
her afterwards if she didn’t think it looked like you, she said 
not a bit; anyhow she had only been joking, and it was an 
ugly portrait. Then, this morning at breakfast, when I heard 
what happened on the beach, I told her that perhaps she 
would have the chance this afternoon to thank you. Instead of 
being pleased, she answered that she’d thanked you enough al- 
ready, that you had run no risk, as what you did was nothing 
much, after all, and she hoped I wouldn’t bring you. I tell you, 
Brederode, I could have boxed her ears.” 

I must confess that mine tingled, and for a moment I felt 
hurt and angry with the girl, but it was only for a moment. 
Then I laughed. 

“Served you right for forcing me upon her,” said I. “Well, 
it’s evident she’s taken a dislike to me. It must be my business 


90 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

to change that, for I have exactly the opposite feelings toward 

her. Some day I shall make her like me. ” 

“I wonder you can think it worth while to trouble your 
head over my cousin, after what I’ve felt it right to tell you,” 
said Rohert. “I thought you ought to know, otherwise you 
would have considered it strange I didn’t ask you to our box, 
as I should have been proud to do ; but I was angry for your 
sake, and said I wouldn’t bring you near her. Now, as things 
are, I don’t see how you can meet my cousin. The van Buren 
blood is at its worst in her, and it has made her obstinate as 
a pig.” 

“Heavens, what a simile !” said I; yet I couldn’t help laugh- 
ing. “I, too, am obstinate as a pig; and being proud of my 
Dutch blood, I like her the better for hers, all the more be- 
cause it’s obstinate blood, and it wouldn’t be true Dutch if 
it were not. I tell you, Robert, I’m going to know your cousin 
— not through you; I don’t want that now, but in some other 
way, which will arrange itself sooner or later — probably 
sooner. ” 

“I don’t see how,” Robert repeated. “I was in hopes that 
she and Miss Rivers, her stepsister, could have been persuaded 
by my mother to pay us a long visit, and give up an objection- 
able plan they have. But Cousin Helen — Nell, as Miss Rivers 
calls her — has been pig-headed even with my mother. I am 
sure it is not Miss Rivers’s fault. She is not that kind of girl.” 

“Do you mind telling me the objectionable plan ?” I asked. 

“I shall be glad to tell,” said he, “and see if you don’t agree 
with me that it is monstrous, though, strange to say, now 
mother has talked with the girls, she does not seem to think 
it as bad as she was inclined to at first. She tells me that they 
are determined to persist, and she thinks they will come to no 
harm. My cousin has been left a motor-boat by a friend’s will. 
You must have seen it: Captain Noble’s ‘Lorelei,’ which used 
to lie near the Rowing Club. She and Miss Rivers have come 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 91 
to take a trip through the waterways of Holland, though my 
mother has learned that their financial circumstances hardly 
warrant such an undertaking. ” 

“Plucky girls !” was my comment. 

“Ah, but you don’t know all. A young man is going with 
them, a strange American young man, whom they never saw 
till yesterday.” 

“By Jove! In what capacity — as chauffeur?” 

“Not at all. As a sort of paying guest, so far as I can under- 
stand the arrangement. ” 

“It sounds rather an odd one.” 

“I should say so; but I mustn’t make you think it’s worse 
than it is. There was a misunderstanding about the boat. 
The American thought he’d hired it from the caretaker, and 
they were sorry for his disappointment. He has an aunt, a 
Scotswoman of title, who is to be of the party.” 

“That makes all the difference, doesn’t it ? — not the title, 
but the aunt. ” 

“It makes a difference, certainly; but the man may be an 
adventurer. He’s an artist, it appears, named Starr ” 

“What, the Starr whose Salon picture made so much talk in 
Paris this spring ?” 

“Yes; but being a good artist doesn’t constitute him a good 
man. He might make love to the girls.” 

“Beast! So he might, aunt or no aunt. She’ll probably aid 
and abet him. I don’t know that I blame you for objecting to 
such an adventure for your cousin.” 

“Oh, it isn’t so much for her — that is, except on principle. 
But I’ve done all I can, and my mother has done all she can, 
so you can imagine what my cousin’s pig-headedness is like to 
resist us both. My mother tells me she could do nothing with 
her; and the girls are leaving us to-morrow. They go back to 
Rotterdam, where they expect to find Starr’s aunt, and, they 
hope, a skipper for the motor-boat. Cousin Helen asked if I 


92 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

could recommend a suitable man; but even if I knew one, I 
should not make it easier for her to flout the wishes of the 
family.” 

“Naturally not,” said I, with, the sort of fellow-feeling for 
Robert which makes one wondrous kind. And I was sure that 
if I were Miss Van Buren’s cousin, and had set myself against 
her doing a certain thing, she would not have done it. 

“However, they are returning to Rotterdam early in the 
morning, and that being the case, as I was saying, I don’t see 
how it will be possible for you to meet my cousin.” 

“I bet that I will meet her, and be properly introduced, 
too, before either of us is a week older,” said I, and then was 
sorry I had clothed my resolve in such crude words. But it 
was too late to explain or apologize, for at that instant two or 
three men came up. The thought of what I had blurted out 
lay heavy on my mind afterwards, and if it had not seemed a 
far-fetched and even school-missish thing to do, I would have 
sent a line to Robert asking him to erase that clumsy and 
impertinent boast from his memory. If he is stupid enough 
or awkward enough to repeat anything of our conversation, 
and give Miss Van Buren the impression that I tried to make 
a wager concerning her, it will be all up with me, I know. 

As it is, I can only hope that my words will go out at one 
ear as fast as they went in at the other. 

Next morning I had made no definite plan of action, but 
thought that as Miss Van Buren was going to Rotterdam, it 
could do no harm for me to go to Rotterdam too, and see 
what would happen next. Things of some sort were bound to 
happen, and one way or other my chance might come before 
she started on her journey. 

My mother is at Chateau Liliendaal, the place where she 
likes best to spend July and August when we don’t run over to 
England; but she didn’t expect me to join her for some days, 
and meanwhile I was free to do as I chose. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 93 

I was in hopes that I might see Miss Van Buren in the 
train, if I took the most popular one in the morning; but she 
and her stepsister were not on board, so I fancied Robert 
must be driving them back in the borrowed car, despite his 
objections to their proceedings. 

I went straight to the Rowing Club, where I have several 
friends, and as I knew from Robert that the motor-boat was 
‘ Lorelei * I easily found out where she was lying. The next 
thing was to go and have a look at her, to see if preparations 
were being made for an immediate start. 

I had forgotten what she was like, but I found her a hand- 
some little craft, with two cabins, and deck-room to accom- 
modate four or five passengers; also I learned from a man em- 
ployed on the quay close by that the motor was an American 
one of thirty horse-power. He told me as well, by way of gos- 
sip, that a rakish barge, moored with her pert brass nose al- 
most on “Lorelei’s” stern, had been hired, and would be towed 
by the owners of the motor-boat. 

I didn’t know what to make of this bit of information, as 
Robert had not mentioned a barge; but the skylight meant a 
studio, so I saw the man Starr’s hand in the arrangement, and 
began to hate the fellow. 

By the time I had loitered in the neighborhood for half 
an hour or more, it was noon, and it occurred to me that I 
might go and lunch at Miss Van Buren’s hotel. But this would 
look like dogging the girl’s footsteps, and eventually I decided 
upon a more subtle means of gaining my end. 

Nevertheless, I strolled past the house; but, seeing nobody 
worth seeing, I reluctantly turned my steps farther on to a 
garden restaurant — a middle-class place, with tables under 
chestnuts and beeches or in shady arbors for parties of two 
or four. 

It was early still, but the restaurant is popular, and all the 
small tables under the trees were appropriated. Fortunately, 


94 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

several arbors were empty, although one or two were engaged, 

and I walked into the first I came to. 

For a few moments I was kept waiting, then a fluent 
waiter appeared to recommend the most desirable dishes of 
the day. His eloquence was in full tide, when a man paused 
before the entrance of my arbor, hesitated, and went on to 
the next. 

“That is engaged, sir,” called out the waiter. 

“I don’t understand Dutch,” answered the new-comer in 
American-English. “Can you speak French ?” 

The waiter could, and did. The man — a good-looking fel- 
low, with singularly brilliant black eyes and a fetching smile 
— explained that it was he who had engaged the arbor, that 
he was expecting a lady, and would not order luncheon until 
she joined him. 

He sat down with his gray flannel back to me, but I could 
see him through the screen of leaves and lattice, and it was 
clear that he was nervous. He kept jumping up, going to the 
doorway, staring out, and returning to throw himself on the 
hard green bench with an impatient sigh. Evidently She was 
late. 

An omelet arrived for me, and still my neighbor was alone; 
but I had scarcely taken up my fork when a light, tripping 
step sounded crisply on the crushed sea-shells of the path 
outside. A shadow darkened the doorway, and for an instant 
a pocket-edition of a woman, in a neat but well-worn tailor- 
made dress, hung on my threshold. Rather like a trim gray 
sparrow she was, expecting a crumb, then changing her mind 
and hopping further on to find it. 

But the change of mind came only with the springing up of 
the young man in the adjoining arbor. 

11 Aunt Fay , is that you ?” he inquired, in an anxious voice, 
speaking the name with marked emphasis. 

“Oh!” chirped the gray sparrow, flitting to the next door- 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 95 
way, “I must have counted wrong. I saw a young man alone, 
and — Then you are my nephew — Ronald. ” 

She also threw stress upon the name and the relationship, 
and, though I knew nothing of the face that lurked behind a 
tissue veil, I became aware that the lady was an American. 

“Funny thing/’ I said to myself. “They don’t seem to 
have met before. She must be a long-lost aunt. ” 

My neighbor would have ushered his relative into the ar- 
bor, but she lingered outside. 

“Come, Tibe,” she cried, with a shrill change of tone. 
“Here, Tibe, Tibe, Tibe!” 

There was a sudden stir in the garden, a pulling of chairs 
closer to small tables, a jumping about of waiters, a few stifled 
shrieks in feminine voices, and a powerful tan-colored bull- 
dog, with a peculiarly concentrated and earnest expression 
on his countenance, bounded through the crowd toward his 
mistress, with a fine disregard of obstacles. Evidently, if 
there was any dodging to be done, he had been brought up to 
expect others to do it; and I thought the chances were that 
he would seldom be disappointed. 

“Good heavens!” exclaimed Nephew Ronald, as the mon- 
ster cannoned against him. “You didn’t mention This.” 

“No; I knew you were sure to love him. I wouldn’t have 
anything to do with a creature who didn’t. Isn’t he exquisite ?” 

“He’s a dream,” said the young man; but he did not 
specify what kind of dream. 

“Where I go, there Tibe goes also,” went on the lady. “His 
name is Tiberius, but it’s rather long to say when he’s doing 
something that you want him to stop. He’ll lunch with us 
like a perfect gentleman. Oh, he is more flower than dog! 
Tibe, come away from that door instantly /” 

The flower had paused to see whether he approved of my 
lunch, and from the way he turned back a protruding black 
drapery of underlip from a pair of upstanding ivory tusks, I 


96 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

judged that neither it nor I found favor in his eyes. Perhaps 
he resented laughter in mine; yet there was something after 
all in the flower simile, if not precisely what the blossom’s 
adoring mistress meant. Tibe’s face distinctly resembled a 
pansy, but an appalling pansy, the sort of pansy you would 
not like to meet in the dark. 

Whatever may have been his opinion of me, he had to be 
dragged by the collar from my door, and later I caught the 
glitter of his gaze through the lattice. 

Aunt Fay slipped in between bench and table, sitting down 
opposite to me, and when the nephew took his old place I had 
glimpses of her over his shoulder. 

She was unfastening her veil. Now it had fallen. Alas 
for any hopes which the trim, youthful figure might have 
raised ! Her thick gray hair was plastered down over temples, 
cheeks, and ears, and a pair of uncommonly large blue spec- 
tacles left her eyes to the imagination. 

“I began to be afraid there might have been some mistake 
in the telegram I sent, after I got your letter saying I mustn’t 
come to your address,” began Nephew Ronald, hastily, after 
a moment of silence that followed the dropping of the veil. 
“What I said was, ‘ Buiten Oord, third arbor on the left as 
you come in by main entrance, lunch quarter past twelve. 
Any cabman will know the place.’ Was the message all 
right ?” 

“Yes,” replied Aunt Fay; “but I suffer a little with my 
eyes. That’s why I stopped when I came to the next arbor. 
I’m late, because darling Tibe ran away just as I was hailing a 
cab, so I had to let that one go, and rescue him from the 
crowd. Wherever he goes he has a throng round him. People 
admire him so much. Down, my angel! You mustn’t put 
your feet on strange gentlemen’s tables, when you’re invited 
to lunch. He’s hungry, poor lamb. ” 

“I hope you are also,” said Nephew, politely; but his voice 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 97 
was heavy. I wondered if he were disappointed in Aunt, 
or if it was only that the Pansy had got on his nerves. “Here’s 
my waiter. We’ll have something to eat, and talk things over 
as we lunch. There’s a tremendous menu for a table d'hote 
meal — thoroughly Dutch. No other people could get through 
it and live. Probably you would prefer ” 

“Let me see. Potage d’Artois; Caneton de Luxembourg; 
Soles aux fines herbes; Pommes Natures; Fricandeau de 
Veau; Haricots Princesse; Poulet roti; Compote; Homard 
frais; Sauce Ravigottes; Salad mele; Creme au chocolat; 
Fromage; Fruit. Humph, funnily arranged, isn’t it ? But 
Tibe and I have been living in furnished lodgings, and we — 
er — have eaten rather irregularly. I dare say between us we 
might manage the lunch as it is.” 

Nephew Ronald ordered it, and another silence fell. I 
think that he drummed on the table. 

“We might as well get to business,” suggested the lady. 
“Does the aunt engagement begin immediately ?” 

“I — er — there’s one difficulty,” faltered the young man. 
“Unfortunately I injudiciously let drop that my aunt was a 
j fine woman.” 

“Really ! You might better have waited till you made her 
acquaintance. You can’t pick and choose in a hurry, when you 
must have a ready-made aunt, my dear sir. Myself, I prefer 
small women. They are more feminine.” 

“Please don’t be angry. You see, it was like this. I said 
that, when I still hoped to have a real aunt on hand for my 
purpose. That was the way the scrape began. I inadvertently 
let out her name and a lot of things ” 

“To the young ladies I’m to chaperon ?” 

“Yes, to the young ladies. If they remember the descrip- 
tion ” 

“You can say you referred to your aunt’s character when 
you remarked that she was a fine woman.” 


98 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I suppose so” (still doubtfully). “But then there’s an- 
other trouble, you know. I advertised in Het Nieus van 
den Bag for a Scotch aunt.” 

I moved suddenly, for a queer thought jumped into my 
head. The blue spectacles were focused on me, and there 
was a low murmur, to which the man responded in his usual 
tone. “No danger. Butch. I heard him talking to the waiter.” 

Now, perhaps I should have called through the lattice and 
the leaves: “Combination of Dutch and English. Half and 
half. As much at home in one language as the other.” But 
for several reasons I was silent. One was, that it was easier to 
be silent than to make a fuss. Another was that, if the sus- 
picion which had just sprung into my head had any founda- 
tion, it was mine or any man’s duty to know the truth and act 
upon it. So I sat still, and went on with my luncheon as my 
next door neighbors went on with theirs; and no one remem- 
bered my existence except Tibe. 

“I’ve no moral objection to being a Scotch aunt,” said the 
obliging lady. 

“It’s your accent, not your morals, that sticks in my throat.” 

“The latter, I trust were sufficiently vouched for in the 
letter from our American Consul here. You can call on him if 
you choose. Few ready-made aunts obtained by advertise- 
ment would have what I have to recommend me. As for a 
Scotch accent, I’ve bought Burns, and a Crockett in Tau- 
chnitz, and by to-morrow I’ll engage that no one — unless a 
Scotsman — would know me from a Scotswoman. Hoot, 
awa’, mon. Come ben.” 

“But — er — my aunt’s rather by way of being a swell. 
She wouldn’t be found dead saying ‘ hoot, awa’, ’or ‘come ben. ’ 
There’s just a little indescribable burr-r ” 

“Then I will have just a little indescribable burr-r. And 
you can buy me a Tartan blouse and a Tam.” 

“I’m afraid a Tam wouldn’t — wouldn’t quite suit your 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 99 
style, or — or that of any well-regulated aunt; and a well- 
regulated aunt is absolutely essential to the situation. I ” 

“Do you mean to insinuate that I am not a well-regulated 
aunt?” There was a rustling in the arbor. “Come, Tibe,” 
the lady added in a firm voice, “you and I will go away and 
leave this gentlemen to select from all the other charming and 
eligible aunts who have no doubt answered his quite conven- 
tional and much-to-be-desired advertisement.” 

“For heaven’s sake, don’t go !” cried the man, springing to 
his feet. “There, your dog’s got the duck. But it doesn’t 
matter. Nobody else worth speaking o*f — nobody jn any way 
possible — has answered my advertisement. I can’t lose you. 
But, you see, I somehow fancied from your letter that you were 
large and imposing, just what I wanted; and you said you’d 
lately been in Scotland ” 

“The accent was one of the few things I did not wish to 
bring away with me,” sniffed the lady. “Under the table, 
Tibe; we’re not going, after all, for the moment. And as you 
have the duck, you may as well eat it.” 

“Good dog,” groaned the stricken young man. If he had 
not, to the best of my belief, been engaged in concocting a 
treacherous plot against one whom I intended to protect, I 
could have pitied him. 

Both sat dowm again. There was a pause while plates were 
changed, and then the female plotter took up the running. 

“I may be conceited,” said she, “but my opinion is that 
you’re very lucky to get me. I may not be Scotch, and I may 
not be a ‘swell, ’ but I am — a lady.” 

“Oh — of course.” 

“What were the others like who answered your advertise- 
ment ?” 

“All Dutch, and spoke broken English, except one, who 
was German. She wore a reform dress, hunched up behind 
with unspeakable elastic things. You’d make allowances if 


100 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

you knew what I’ve gone through since the day before yester- 
day, when I found, after telegraphing a frantic appeal to my 
aunt in Scotland, that she’s left home and they could give me 
no address, I’ve had an awful time. My nerves are shattered.” 

“Then you’d better secure peace by securing me. An aunt 
in the hand is worth two in the bush.” 

“A good aunt needs no bush. I mean — oh, I don’t know 
what I mean; but, of course, I ask nothing better than to 
secure you.” 

“No; you mean you think you’ll get nothing better. Ha, 
ha ! I agree with you. But Tibe and I didn’t come here to be 
played with. You’re giving us a very good lunch, but I have 
his future and mine to think of. I admit, I’m in want of an 
engagement as a traveling companion to ladies in Holland; 
but you aren’t the only person to whom it occurs to put ads. 
in Dutch papers. If you’d searched the columns of Het Nieus 
van den Dag you might have seen mine. I have not been 
without answers, and I don’t know that I should care to be an 
aunt, anyway. It makes one seem so old. What I came to 
say was that, unless you can offer me an immediate engage- 
ment ” 

“Oh, I can and do. I beg of you to be my aunt from this 
moment. ” 

“Tibe to travel with me and have every comfort ?” 

“Yes, yes, and luxury.” 

“A pint of warm milk every morning, half a pound of best 
beef or chicken with vegetables at noon, two new-laid eggs 
at ” 

“Certainly. He has* but to choose — he seems to know his 
own mind pretty well.” 

“I don’t think it a subject for joking. That duck was close 
to the edge of the table. We’d better talk business. Your letter 
said a hundred gulden a week to a suitable aunt, and a two 
months’ engagement certain. Well, it’s not enough. I should 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 101 
want at least three hundred dollars extra, down in advance 
(I can’t do it in gulden in my head) for your sake.” 

“For my sake ?” 

“Don’t you see, to do you credit as a relative, I must have 
things, nice things, plenty of nice things ? Tartan blouses, and 
if not Tams, cairngorms. Yes, a cairngorm brooch would be 
realistic. I saw a beauty yesterday — only two hundred gulden. 
No aunt of yours can go for a trip on the waterways of Hol- 
land unless she’s well fitted out.” 

“I’ve been admiring the dress you are wearing. It’s won- 
derfully trim.” 

“Thanks. But it happens to be about a hundred years old, 
and is the only one I have left. As for my hat, and boots — but 
Tibe and I have suffered some undeserved vicissitudes of late.” 

“I’m sorry to hear that. Of course you must have three 
hundred dollars to begin with.” 

“By the way, am I Mrs. or Miss ?” 

“You must know best as to ” 

“I mean me in the part of your aunt.” 

“Oh, you’re neither Miss nor Mrs.” 

11 Really /” 

“I mean, you’re married, but you have a title.” 

“That will come more expensive. A person of title should 
have a diamond guard for her wedding-ring. You feel that, 
don’t you ?” 

“Now you speak of it, I do.” 

“Would you like her to wear a cap for indoors ?” 

“Sounds as if she were a parlormaid ” 

“Not at all. I’m sure a proper Scotch aunt would wear a 
cap.” 

“Mine’s a proper Scotch aunt, and she doesn’t.” She’s 
about forty, but she looks twenty-five. Nobody would believe 
she was anybody’s aunt.” 

“But you want everybody to believe I’m yours ?” 


102 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Oh, have a cap by all means.” 

“It should be real lace.” 

“Buy it.” 

“And another to change with.” 

“Buy that too. Get a dozen if you like.” 

“Thanks, I will. I believe you just said the engagement 
dates from to-day ?” 

“Rather. I was going to tell you, I must have an aunt by 
this evening. She arrives from Scotland, you know.” 

“With her dog. That's easy.” 

“I hope the girls like dogs. ” 

“They do if they’re nice girls.” 

“They’re enchanting girls, one English, one American. I 
adore both: that’s why I’m a desperate man where an aunt’s 
concerned. To produce an aunt is my one hope of enjoying 
their society on the motor-boat trip I wrote you about. I 
wouldn’t do this thing if I weren’t desperate, and even des- 
perate as I am, I wouldn’t do it if I couldn’t have got an all- 
right kind of aunt, an aunt that — that ” 

“That an unimpeachable American Consul could vouch, 
for. I assure you. Nephew, you ought to think of a woman 
like me as of — of a ram caught in the bushes.” 

“I’m willing to think of you in that way, if it’s not offen- 
sive. The Consul didn’t go into particulars ” 

“That was unnecessary.” 

“Perhaps. Everything’s settled, then. I’ll count you out 
five hundred dollars in gulden. Buy what you choose — so 
long as it’s aunt-like. I’ll meet your train at — we’ll say 
seven, the Beurs Station.” 

“I understand. I’ll be there with Tibe and our luggage. 
But you haven’t told me your name yet. I signed my letter to 
you, Mary Milton. You cautiously ” 

“Ronald L. Starr is your nephew’s name. Lady Mac- 
Nairne is my aunt’s.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 103 

I came very near choking myself with a cherry-stone. 
Long before this I’d been sure of his name, but I hadn’t 
expected to hear Lady MacNairne’s. 

“Forty, and looks twenty-five,” 

Yes, that was a fair description of Lady MacNairne, as far 
as it went; but much more might be said by her admirers, of 
whom I openly declared myself one, before a good-sized 
audience at a country house in Scotland, not quite a year ago. 

It was merely a little flirtation, to pass the time, on both 
our parts. A woman of forty who is a beauty and a flirt has 
no time to waste, and Lady MacNairne is not wasteful. She 
was the handsomest woman at Kinloch Towers, my cousin 
Dave Norman’s place, and a Dutchman was a novelty to her; 
so we amused ourselves for ten days, and I should have kept 
the pleasantest memory of the episode if Sir Alec had not 
taken it into his head to be jealous. 

Poor Fleda MacNairne was whisked away before the 
breaking-up of the house-party, and that is the last I have 
seen of her, but not the last I’ve heard. Once in a while I get a 
letter, amusing, erratic, like herself; and in such communi- 
cations she doesn’t scruple to chronicle other flirtations which 
have followed hard on mine. Only a short time before the 
making of this plot in a Rotterdam garden, a letter from her 
gave startling news: consequently I am now in possession of 
knowledge apparently denied to the nephew. 

A few minutes more and the pair in the next arbor sepa- 
rated, the woman departing to purchase the fittings of aunt- 
hood, the man remaining to pay the bill. But before he had 
time to beckon the waiter I got up and walked into his lair. 

“Mr. Starr,” I said, “I’m going to stop your game.” 

“The devil you are! And who are you?” answered he, 
first staring, then flushing. 

“My name’s Rudolph Brederode,” said I. 

“You’re ad — d eavesdropper,” said he. 


104 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“You are the same kind of a fool, for thinking because 
your neighbor spoke Dutch he couldn’t know English. I sat 
still and let you go on, because I don’t mean to allow any of 
the persons concerned to be imposed upon by you.” 

He glared at me across the table as if he could have killed 
me, and I glared back at him ; yet all the while I was conscious 
of a sneaking kindness for the fellow, he looked so stricken 
— rather like an endearing scamp of an Eton boy who has 
got into a horrid scrape, and is being hauled over the coals 
by the Head. 

“What business is it of yours ?” he wanted to know. 

“Lady MacNairne’s a friend of mine.” 

“Indeed ! But what of that ? She’s my aunt.” 

“And Robert van Buren is another friend, an intimate one. 
He has told me about his cousin’s motor-boat. He doesn’t 
approve of the tour, as it is. When he hears from me ” 

“Oh, hang it all, why do^ou want to be such a spoilsport ?” 
demanded the poor wretch in torture. “Did you never fall in 
love with a girl, and feel you’d do anything to get her ?” 

This sudden change, this throwing himself upon my mercy, 
took me somewhat aback. In threatening to tear the mote 
from his eye, what about a certain obstruction in mine ? 

He was quick to see his advantage and follow it up. 

“You say you heard everything. Then you must see why 
I thought of this plan. I hoped at first Aunt Fleda might be 
prevailed on to come. When I lost that hope I just couldn’t 
give up the trip. I had to get an aunt to chaperon those 
blessed girls, or it was good-by to them, for me. What harm 
am I doing ? The woman’s respectable; the Consul has writ- 
ten me a letter about her. If you know Aunt Fay — that’s 
my name for her — you know she would call this the best 
kind of a lark. I’ll confess to her some day. I’d have my head 
cut off sooner than injure Miss Rivers or Miss Van Buren. 
Afterwards, when we’ve got to be great friends, they shall hear 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 105 
the whole story, I promise; but of course, you can ruin me if 
you tell them, or let your friend tell them, at this stage. Do 
you think it’s fair to take advantage of what you overheard 
by accident, and spoil the chance of my life ? Oh, say now, 
what can I do to make you keep still ?” 

“Well, I’m — hanged /” was all I could answer. And a 
good deal to my own surprise, I heard myself suddenly burst 
into sardonic laughter. 

Then he laughed, too, and we roared together. If any one 
noticed us, they must have thought us friends of a lifetime; 
yet five minutes ago we had been like dogs ready to fly at each 
other’s throats, and there was no earthly reason why we should 
not be of the same mind still. 

“You are going to let me alone, aren’t you ?” he continued 
to plead, when he was calmer. “You are going to do unto me 
as you’d be done by, and give my true love a chance to run 
smooth ? If you refuse, I could wish that fearful Flower back 
that I might set him at you.” 

My lips twitched. “I’m not sure,” said I, “whether you 
ought* to be in a gaol or in the school-room.” 

“I ought to be on a motor-boat tour with the two most 
charming girls in the world; and if I’m not to be there, I 
might as well be in my grave. Do ask people about me. Ask my 
aunt. I’m not a villain I’m one of the nicest fellows you ever 
met, and I’ve no bad intentions. I’ve got too much money 
to be an adventurer. Why, look here ! I’m supposed to be quite 
a good match. Either of the girls can have me and my millions. 
Both are at the feet of either. At present I’ve no choice. 
Don’t drive me to drink. I should hate to die of Schnapps; 
and there’s nothing else liquid I could well die of in Holland.” 

As he talked, I had been thinking hard and fast. I should 
have to spare hi'm. I saw that. But — I saw something else too. 

“I’ll keep your ridiculous secret, Mr. Starr, on one con- 
dition,” I said. 


106 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“You’ve only to name it.” 

“Invite me to go with you on the trip.” 

“My dear fellow, for heaven’s sake don’t ask me the one 
thing I can’t do. It’s cruelty to animals. It isn’t my trip. 
I’m a guest. Perhaps you don’t understand ” 

“Yes, I do. Van Buren told me. He mentioned that you 
hadn’t been able to get a skipper to take the motor-boat 
through the canals.” 

“That’s true. But we shan’t be delayed. We have our 
choice between two chaps with fair references; not ideal men, 
perhaps; but you don’t need an admiral to get you through a 
herring-pond ” 

“Each canal is different from every other. You must have 
a first-rate man, who knows every inch of the way, whatever 
route you choose, or you’ll get into serious trouble. Now, as 
you’ve been praising yourself, I’ll follow your example. You 
couldn’t find a skipper who knows more about 4 botoring ’ and 
Dutch waterways than I do, and I volunteer for the job. I go 
if you go; there’s the offer.” 

“Are you serious ?” All his nonsense was suddenly forgotten. 

“Absolutely.” 

“Why do you want to go ? You must have a reason.” 

“I have. It’s much the same as yours.” 

“I’m blowed ! Then you’ve met — Them.” 

“I’ve seen them. Apparently that’s about all you’ve done.” 

“You mean, if I won’t get you on board as skipper you’ll 
give me away ?” 

I was silent. I did not now mean anything of the kind, 
for it would be impossible to betray the engaging wretch. But 
I was willing that he should think my silence gave consent. 

“They would know you weren’t a common hired skipper. 
How could I explain you ?” 

“Why, say you’ve a Dutch friend who has — kindly offered 
to go, as you can’t find any one else who’s competent for the 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 107 
job. You’d better not mention your friend’s name at first, if 
you can avoid it. As the ladies have been anxious about the 
skipper, and asked van Buren to get one, they’ll probably be 
thankful it’s all right, and only too glad to accept a friend of 
yours in the place.” 

“Poor, deceived angels ! What’s to prevent your snatching 
one of them from under my very nose ?” 

“You must run the risk of that. Besides, you needn’t worry 
about it till you make up your mind which angel you want.” 

“I should naturally want whichever one you did. We are 
made like that.” 

“If you don’t agree, and they go ‘botoring’ without you, 
you can’t get either.” 

“That’s true. Most disagreeable things are. And there’s 
just a chance, if you get dangerous, that Tibe might polish you 
off. I saw the way he looked at you. Well, needs must when 
somebody drives. It’s a bargain then. I’ll tell the girls what 
a kind, generous Dutch friend I have. We’ll be villains to- 
gether. ” 


IX 


W E settled that Starr should see Miss Van Buren 
and Miss Rivers and tell them that skipper, 
chauffeur, and chaperon all being provided, 
there was nothing to prevent the tour beginning 
to-morrow. Having done this, without bringing in his obliging 
friend’s name, he was so meet me at the Rowing Club at 
three o’clock with a detailed report of all that had happened 
up to date. 

Never was time slower in passing. Each minute seemed as 
long as the dying speech of a tragedian who fancies himself in 
a death scene. I wanted to use some of these minutes in 
writing to Robert, but it would be premature to tell him that I 
was going to look after his cousin and her sister on the trip, as 
the ladies might abandon it, rather than put up with my 
society. 

When ten minutes past three came, and no Starr, I was 
certain that they would not have me. I could hardly have been 
gloomier if I’d been waiting for a surgical operation. But 
another five minutes brought my confederate, and the first 
sight of his face sent my spirits up with a bound. 

“It’s all right,” he said. “They’ve come back from Sche- 
veningen. I saw them at their hotel, and they’re more beauti- 
ful than ever. They were prostrate with grief at hearing I 
hadn’t been able to get hold of a skipper; consequently they 
were too excited to ask your name when I gave them the 
cheering news that a Dutch friend had come to the rescue. 
They simply swallowed you whole, and clamored for the next 
course, so I added the — er — glad tidings of my aunt’s 

108 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 109 
arrival this evening, and poured the last drop of joy in their 
cup by saying we could start to-morrow. They’re going to 
bring most of their things on board after tea this afternoon, 
about five. Oh, by the way, just as I was leaving, Miss Van 
Buren did call after me, ‘ Is your friend nice ?’ ” 

I laughed. “What did you answer ?” 

“I thought one more fib among so many couldn’t matter, 
so I said you were. Heaven forgive me. By-the-by, are you 
really Dutch, or is that another — figure of speech ?” 

“I always think and speak of myself as wholly Dutch,” I 
replied. “But my mother is English. By-the-by, I must 
telegraph her; and I must write my man to bring me some 
clothes the first thing to-morrow morning. Then you’d better 
send for the chauffeur you’ve engaged; and we’ll go together 
to interview him on the boat before the ladies come. I think — 
er — it won’t be best for me to meet them till to-morrow. Are 
you sure your chauffeur’s a good man ?” 

“Not at all,” said Starr, airily. “I merely know that he’s 
a very young youth, who makes you feel like a grandfather at 
twenty-seven; who wriggles and turns pink if you speak to 
him suddenly, and when he wants his handkerchief to mop his 
perpetually moist forehead, pulls yards of cotton waste out of 
his pocket, by mistake. I’ve only his word for it — which I 
couldn’t understand, as it was in Dutch — that he has the 
slightest knowledge of any motor. But he showed me written 
references, and seemed so proud of what they set forth, I 
thought they must be all right, though I couldn’t read them.” 

“You’re a queer fellow!” I exclaimed. 

“Well, you see, I’m an artist — neither motorist nor botorist. 
By the way, what are you, beyond being van Buren’s friend ?” 

“A Jack of several trades,” said I. “I know a bit about 
horses, botors, motors; I fancy I’m a judge of dogs (I con- 
gratulate you on Tibe), also of chauffeurs, so come along and 
we’ll put yours through his paces.” 


110 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

It now appeared that Starr had the youth on board. So 
I sent my two telegrams, and we started to walk to the boat. 
On the way Starr told me more than I had heard from Robert 
about his first dealings with “Lorelei,” and we discussed de- 
tails of the trip. The ladies have no choice, it appears, except 
that they will feel ill-used if allowed to miss anything. As for 
Starr, he confessed blissful ignorance of Holland. 

“I want to go where cows wear coats, and women wear 
gold helmets, and dogs have revolving kennels,” he said. 
“And I want to paint everything I see.” 

“Cows wear coats at Gouda. I expect you read that in 
Carlyle’s ‘Sartor Resartus.’ Women wear gold helmets in 
Friesland. Dogs have revolving kennels in Zeeland,” I told 
him. “And if you want to paint everything you see, we shall 
be gone a long time.” 

“All the better,” said Starr. 

I agreed. 

“It would be useful if you could plan out a trip,” he went 
on. “It would help to account for you, you know, and make 
you popular.” 

I caught at this idea. There are a good many places that 
I should like to show Miss Van Buren, and visit with her. 
“I should have preferred her seeing my country on our wed- 
ding-trip,” I said to myself. “This is the next best, though, 
and we can have the honeymoon in Italy.” But aloud I re- 
marked that I would map out something and submit it to 
my passengers in the morning. 

My mother laughs, telling me that I must always go in for 
any new fad, whatever it may be, and that she expects some 
day to see several makes of airship tethered on the lawn at 
Liliendaal, or tied to our chimneys at The Hague in winter. 
There’s something in her jibe, perhaps; but it would be a 
queer thing, indeed, if a son of the water-country didn’t turn 
to “botoring,” provided he had any soul for sport. We Hoi- 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 111 
landers made practical use of motor-boats while the people 
of dry lands still poked ridicule at them in comic illustrated 
papers; therefore this will be by no means my first experience. 
I had that three years ago with a racer, and again with a barge 
which I fitted up with a twenty horse-power motor, and used 
for a whole summer, after which, in a generous mood, I gave 
her as a wedding-gift to my chauffeur, whose bride’s greatest 
ambition was for barge-life. Since that time I’ve always meant 
to get something good in the botoring line, but haven’t made 
up my mind what it ought to be. 

I did myself no more than justice in telling Starr that I 
was as desirable a man as he could find for skipper; and I 
shook hands with myself for every hour of botoring I had 
done. Thanks to past experience I can now do chauffeur’s 
work, if necessary, as well as skipper’s. 

We found the “very young youth” on deck, industriously 
polishing brass-work, and his complexion bore out Starr’s 
description as I questioned him about his former situations. 
It seems there was .only one, and with a small boat ; but the 
motor was the same as this. 

The arrangement of “Lorelei’s” deck aft pleases me particu- 
larly, for it might have been designed to suit my purpose. 
That purpose is to have as much of Miss Van Buren’s society 
as possible during this trip. Consequently I saw with pleasure 
that the passengers in their deck-chairs must group round the 
skipper at his wheel, as there is no other comfortable place. 
There will be no notice up on board “Lorelei”: “Please do not 
speak to the man at the wheel.” The more he is spoken to — 
by the right person — the better he will like his job. What 
I have to pray for is dry weather, that the ladies may spend 
their days on deck, for just as much time as they spend below 
I shall consider that I am wasting. Indeed, I regret the at- 
tractiveness of the cabins, for I fear there may be a tempta- 
tion to dawdle there, or lie among cushions on the comfortable 


112 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

seat-bunks on a gray or chilly day. “I hope she’s as much 
interested in scenery as she apparently is in history,” I said 
to myself as Starr and I wandered over the boat, “for the 
skipper-job can be combined with the business of lecturer and 
cicerone , if that proves a bid for popularity.” 

Aft of the cabins is the motor-house; and hearing our 
voices through the skylight, chauffeur Hendrik left the brass- 
work and came to stand by his engine. I immediately deter- 
mined to study this engine thoroughly, so that if Hendrik’s 
intelligence prove untrustworthy in an emergency, mine may 
be prepared to assist it. 

He soon saw that it was useless to “show off” before me, 
but he enjoyed explaining the motor in broken English to 
Starr. The American artist heard with a vague smile the dif- 
ference between the ordinary four-cycle engine of an auto- 
mobile, and the two-cycle engine of this marine motor, with 
its piston receiving an impulse at each down stroke; tried 
to understand how the charge of vaporized petrol was drawn 
into the crank-chamber, and there slightly compressed; how 
the gas afterwards traveled along a by-pass into the firing 
chamber at the upper part of the cylinder, to be further com- 
pressed by the up-stroke of the piston and fired by the spark- 
ing plug, while the burnt gases escaped through a port un- 
covered by the piston in its downward strokes, admission 
and exhaust being thus controlled by the piston movement 
alone. 

“Great heavens! I wronged this good youth,” the patient 
listener cried, when he found a chance to speak. “I thought 
him all pinkness, and perspiration, and purple velvet slippers, 
but he can pull information by the yard out of his brain, as 
he does cotton waste out of his pocket. Unfortunately, it’s 
waste too, as far as I’m concerned; for I don’t know any more 
about this motor now than I did when he began. The tap 
of my intelligence always seems to be turned off the minute 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 113 
anything technical or mechanical is mentioned. Some of 
those things he said sounded more like the description of a 
lunatic asylum than anything else, and the only impression 
left on my mind is one of dreadful gloom.” 

“Why ?” I asked. 

“Because it seems impossible that anything which has to 
do so much at the same time as this engine does, can remember 
to do half of it. It will certainly fail, and blow up with those 
we love on board. I never thought of that until now, and 
shouldn’t if Hendrik hadn’t explained things to me.” 

“We can’t blow up unless the petrol gets on fire,” said I, 
“and as the tank’s away at the bow of the boat and the petrol 
descends to the engine by gravity and not pressure, you needn’t 
have nightmare on that subject.” 

“That’s another horror I hadn’t realized,” groaned Starr. 
“I took things for granted, and trusted other people to know 
them. A whole tank of petrol at the bow ! How much will there 
be in it ?” 

“Enough to last four days.” 

“One of the ladies is sure to set it on fire when she’s curling 
her hair with a spirit-lamp. Yet we can’t forbid them to curl 
their hair on their own boat. Perhaps they’d better sleep on 
the barge, after all. I meant it to be for the men of the party.” 

“Nonsense,” said I. “They’re reasonable creatures. Be- 
sides, Miss Van Buren’s hair curls naturally ” 

“How can you know ?” 

“Well, I do.” And before my eyes arose the picture of a 
bright goddess of foam and spray. 

“Hum ! I begin to see which way the wind blows. I’m not 
sure she isn’t the one I myself ” 

“We were talking about the motor,” I cut in. “The water 
jacketing seems thoroughly carried out; and when the party’s 
assembled on deck, it will hear no more noise than the buzzing 
of a big bee, as the exhaust is led away below the water-line. 


114 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

It won’t be bad in the cabins either, even when they keep the 
sliding door open, for this screen of thick sail-cloth will deaden 
what sound there is. And it was a smart idea to utilize the 
power of the magneto to light up the whole boat with those 
incandescent burners . ” 

“Your mechanical information, on top of Hendrik’s, is 
giving me a kind of acute mental dyspepsia,” sighed Starr. 
“I hate well-informed people; they’re so fond of telling you 
things you don’t want to know. Still, I realize that you’re 
going to be useful in a way, so I suppose I must make the 
best of you; and, anyhow, we shan’t see much of each other, 
except at meals.” 

“Shan’t we ? Why, are you going to spend most of your 
time on board your barge, steering ?” 

“Not I. I’ve engaged a man. Didn’t I tell you. A nice, 
handy man, not too big for his boots, or rather, his carpet 
slippers. He’ll cook, sweep, dust, and make beds as well as 
keep the barge steady.” 

“While I’m skipper of ‘ Lorelei,’ nobody wears carpet slip- 
pers, or purple velvet ones either, on board this boat or her 
tender. I suppose, if you’re not going to steer, you mean to 
occupy yourself in your studio, painting. A wise arrange- 
ment ” 

“From your point of view. But it isn’t my intention. I 
shall — if the ladies don’t object — sit mostly on ‘ Lorelei’s ’ 
deck, making sketches, and entertaining them as well as I 
know how — though not with technical information.” 

“I shall be there to give them that, if they want it,” said I. 

“ You ? You’ll have to be at the bow, skippering.” 

“I don’t skipper at the bow, thank you. I skipper on deck 
aft, where I stand at the wheel and have full control of the 
engine through this long lever that’s carried up from the en- 
gine-room.” 

“Hang it, I thought Hendrik, as chauffeur, would have to 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 115 
be there, and you’d keep a sort of outlook with a binnacle or 
something, for’rard. You are going to be a regular Albatross 
to my Ancient Mariner, aren’t you ?” 

“Don’t forget that it’s by grace of the Albatross that you’re 
a Mariner at all.” 

“I shall call you ‘Alb,’ when I feel your weight too much,” 
said Starr, and then we two villains of the piece could not 
forbear a grin in each other’s faces. I even found myself 
wondering if the Ancient One and his Bird might not form for 
one another a kind of attachment of habit, in the end. 

It’s certainly a queer association, this of ours, but as the 
Mariner proposed to do, we began to make the best of it; and 
we finished my visit to the boat on outwardly friendly terms. 
We even sat on deck and put our heads together over my 
note-book, in which I jotted down a plan of the tour. With 
“Lorelei,” I assured him, we had but to choose our route, for 
as she draws only from three to three and a half feet of water, 
all the waterways are open to us. Did she draw more, she 
would be useless, even in certain rivers, in a dry season such 
as this is proving, and in many small canals at any season. 
There’s only one thing which may bother us in the Frisian 
Meers, where we can’t shove with a quant pole, or if we ven- 
ture out to sea: we have no means of propulsion except the 
motor, and as we carry no mast, we cannot set so much as a 
yard of canvas. If anything should go wrong with the motor, 
brilliant “Lorelei” will instantly become a mere hulk at the 
mercy of wind and wave. However, as Starr remarked sagely, 
we can stop in port for wind and wave, and be very happy. 

As we talked, down on a page of my note-book went a 
roughly sketched map of Holland, my idea being to begin 
with Gouda, going on to Leiden, slipping through the villa- 
ges of South Holland, which seem strange to travelers, and 
skirting the great polder that was once the famed Haarlemmer- 
Meer.- Then, having seen Haarlem sitting on her throne of 


116 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

flowers, to pass on, giving a few days to Amsterdam and in- 
teresting places in the neighborhood, watery market-towns 
and settlements of the merchant princes. Next in order the 
curious island of Marken, and the artists’ haunts at Volen- 
dam. From there, to turn toward the north and the Dead 
Cities of the Zuider Zee, crossing afterwards to Friesland in 
search of beauties in golden helmets, and lingering for a while 
among the Frisian Meers. Later, we might work our way 
through Holland’s most desolate and savage province, Dren- 
the, to the hills of Gelderland (my native country), and finish 
the trip with a grand climax in Zeeland, most mysterious and 
picturesque of all, half hidden in the sea. 

I traced the proposed route for Starr, telling him that we 
could do such a tour in five weeks or eight, according to the 
inclinations of the travelers, and the. length of time they 
cared to spend in each place. As to that, the ladies must de- 
cide, I said, and choose whether they would sleep each night 
on “Lorelei,” or see more of Dutch life by going to hotels. But, 
in any case, I must plan to bring the boat each evening near 
enough civilization to obtain supplies. 

“A good itinerary,” said the Mariner, approving his Alba- 
tross, “but I warn you I shall claim half the credit. When you 
see me swaggering, and hear me boasting of the plans my 
friend Brederode and I have mapped out, contradict me if 
you dare. I will defy you in some things, or I shall burst of 
sheer spite; and we can test it now, if you like, for here they 
come.” 

It was true. They were in a cab, with luggage under the 
driver’s feet. I had let time slip away, forgetting that I meant 
to escape before five, when Starr had told me they were due. 

But I was determined not to meet them now. There was 
still time for Miss Van Buren to find some excuse and wreck 
the tour, if she were annoyed by my obstinate determination 
to know her. To-morrow there will not be time, unless she 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 117 
cares to make a scene; and I don’t think she is a girl to make 
scenes. 

“No. I’ll leave your friends to you, for the present,” said 
I. “We ought to start by ten to-morrow, and I’ll be on hand 
at nine.” 

“I know not whether to curse or bless you,” said the Mar- 
iner. But I gave him no time to do either. I was off, and out 
of the way before I could be noticed and recognized by the 
occupants of the cab. Then, back to the Club I came to write a 
short letter to Robert, and to jot down a few happenings for 
my own benefit later. 


X 


I T was nine in the morning — a clean-washed morning of 
blue and gold — when I arrived on board “ Lorelei,” 
with a small box which my man brought me from Lilien- 
daal, according to telegraphed orders. 

No one was there but the chauffeur, though on board the 
barge “Waterspin” the “handy man” had arrived, and was 
settling into his new quarters. Toon de Jongh is his name, 
and I conceived a liking for his grave brown face, at sight. 
I know his type well, a type which excels in deeds, not words, 
and was bred in the Low Countries by certain policies of 
Philip Second of Spain. He liked me too, for some reason 
or other, I saw by his eyes, in a way one never mistakes but 
can never explain. 

I had to find my quarters on the barge, and going below, 
on the first door I saw a visiting card of Mr. Ronald L. Starr’s 
conspicuously pinned, with the one word “Alb” printed large 
upon it, in red ink. Chuckling, I took possession of the cabin, 
hauled my things out fr.om my box, and had got them mostly 
packed in lockers and drawers, when I heard the sound of 
voices on “Lorelei.” 

She was there. What would she say when she discovered 
that the man she had “thanked enough and didn’t want to see 
again” had foisted himself upon her party ? 

The evil moment couldn’t be postponed for long. I might 
give them time to go below, and add the contents of their 
dressing-bags to the belongings they had bestowed in the 
cabins yesterday afternoon, but that would take fifteen min- 
utes at most, and then they would be wanting to start. I should 

118 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 119 
have to get on board “Lorelei,” be introduced, and face the 
music, whether it played the “Rogue’s March,” or “Hail, the 
Conquering Hero !” 

The sound of girls’ laughter was so upsetting that I couldn’t 
decide what to do with my collars and neckties. I wandered 
aimlessly about the cabin with my hands full, grumbling 
aloud, “What an ass you are!” and hadn’t yet made up my 
mind to cross over to “Lorelei” when Starr pounded on the 
half-open door. 

“Thank goodness, you’re here!” he exclaimed, as the door 
fell back and revealed me. 

“What has happened to make you give thanks ?” I asked, 
disposing hurriedly of the neckties. 

“Any port in a storm — even Albport. And there is a 
storm, an awful storm; at least “Lorelei’s” staggering about as 
if she were half-seas over, and if you don’t get us off at once 
every soul on board will be lost, or, what’s worse, seasick. A 
nice beginning for the trip !” 

I am so much at home on the water that I hadn’t noticed 
the tossing and lolloping of the barge, but I realized now what 
was the matter. The morning was fresh, with a gusty wind 
blowing up the Maas, against the tide running strongly out; 
and consequently little “Lorelei” and sturdy “Waterspin” 
strained at their moorings like chained dogs who spy a bone 
just beyond their reach. 

I didn’t stop to answer, but bolted off the barge and onto 
the motor-boat. 

Toon and Hendrik cast off the moorings, the chauffeur 
flew below to set his engine going; I took the wheel, pushed 
over the starting lever, the little propeller began to turn, and 
we were away on the first of the watery miles which stretch 
before us, for joy or sorrow. 

Starr had followed Hendrik below, and just as the motor 
was getting well to work, revolving under my feet at the rate 


120 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

of six hundred revolutions a minute, I heard his voice shout- 
ing — 

“Hullo, hullo ! catch the dog ! — 1 you up there.” 

At the same instant arose a babel of cries, “Oh, my angel! 
Don’t let him drown! Save him!” and the Emperor Tiberius 
shot up the companion as if launched from a catapult. Unused 
to engines and a life on the wave, frightened by the teuf-teuf 
of the motor, his next bound would have carried him over- 
board into the river; but hanging on to the wheel with one 
hand, with the other I seized the dog by the collar — a new, 
resplendent collar — just as somebody else, rushing to the 
rescue from below, caught him by the tail. 

It was Miss Van Buren. 

For a second — I bending down, she stretching up — our 
faces were neighbors, and I had time to see her expression 
undergo several lightning changes — surprise, incredulity, 
and a few others not as easy to read — before she retired, 
leaving Tibe to me. Instead of coming up on deck as she had 
evidently intended to do, she vanished, and a head exquisitely 
hatted and blue- veiled appeared in place of hers. 

A moment later the tiny lady of the arbor, transformed 
into Parisian elegance by an effective white yachting costume, 
with a coquettish blue yachting-cap on her gray hair, the 
goggling effect of the glasses softened by the floating folds of 
azure chiffon, arrived to succor her beloved. She started 
slightly, staring at me through veil and spectacles, and I 
deduced that whatever Starr had told his “aunt” about the 
skipper, it had not prepared her to meet the man of the ar- 
bor. Those hidden eyes recognized me, and took in the 
situation. 

Under their fire I realized that the success of my adventure 
might largely depend upon the chaperon; and if, suspecting 
something more than met her gaze, she should strike an atti- 
tude of disapproval, she could prejudice the girls against the 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 121 
skipper, and so manoeuver that he had his trouble for his 
pains. 

With this danger ahead, I redoubled my attentions to 
Tiberius ; but it was fortunate for me that the doubts he enter- 
tained of the man in the arbor were chased away by gratitude 
for the man on the boat. If it had not been so, such is the 
primitive sincerity of dog kind — especially bulldog kind — ■ 
no bribe in my power to offer could have induced him to dis- 
simulate. I knew this, and trembled; but Tibe, being an 
animal of parts, was not long in comprehending that the 
hand on his collar meant well by him. He deigned to fawn, 
and meeting his glance at close quarters, I read his dog-soul 
through the brook-brown depths of the clear eyes. After that 
moment, in which we came to a full understanding one of the 
other, once and for all, I knew that Tibe’s wrinkled mask, 
his terrible mouth, and the ferocious tusks standing up like 
two stalagmites in the black, protruding under jaw, disguised 
a nature almost too amiable and confiding for a world of 
hypocrites. Tragic fate, to seem in the shallow eyes of stran- 
gers a monster of evil from whom to flee, while your warm 
heart, bursting with love and kindness, sends you chasing 
those who avoid you, eager to demonstrate affection ! Such a 
fate is destined to be Tibe’s, so long as he may live; but in this 
first instant of our real acquaintance he felt that I at least saw 
through his disguise; and under the nose and spectacles of his 
mistress he sealed our friendship with a wet kiss on my sleeve. 

“Good boy!” said I, and meant it. He had given me a 
character, and had placed me upon a sound footing with one 
who would be, I foresaw, a Power on “Lorelei.” 

“Thank you so much!” said she, with the promised burr-r 
so pronounced in her accent that she must, I thought, have 
spent the night in practising it. She then carefully selected 
the best chair, and took from another a blue silk cushion which 
matched her yachting-cap and veil. 


122 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

As she sat down, making a footstool of Tibe, and displaying 
two exquisitely shod feet in brand new suede shoes, Miss 
Rivers appeared, pale and interesting. 

“I do hope you’re better, my poor child,” purred the 
Chaperon. 

“Oh, thank you, dear Lady MacNairne, I shall be quite 
right now we’ve started.” 

This interchange of civilities told that the Mariner’s “Aunt 
Fay” had already contrived to ingratiate herself with her 
charges. 

Miss Rivers sank into the nearest chair, closing her eyes, 
while I stood aloof and turned the wheel; but presently the 
languid lashes lifted, and she became conscious of me. Then 
her eyes grew big. She remembered me from the day at the 
Prinzenhof, or the Horse Show, perhaps. Evidently Starr had 
not named me yet, nor had Miss Van Buren, in descending 
after our brief encounter, put any questions. Whether this 
boded ill or well, I could not decide, but longed to get suspense 
over; and I was not kept waiting. 

I heard Starr’s voice below urging Miss Van Buren on deck. 
“Don’t bother about putting everything away,” he said. “Do 
it later. You must say good-by to Rotterdam. Who knows 
what will have happened to us before we get back ?” 

It would not be my fault if two of the party were not en- 
gaged, I was thinking hopefully, as Miss Van Buren’s eyes — 
rising from below like stars above a dark horizon — met 
mine. There was no recognition in them. To all appearance 
oblivious of ever having seen my insignificant features on 
land or sea, she came smiling up, on the friendliest terms with 
Starr. 

The vacant chair, most conveniently placed for her, was 
close to the wheel, and I hoped that she would take it. But 
rather than be thus trapped, she stepped over Tibe and push- 
ed past her stepsister with an “I beg your pardon, dear.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 123 

The Mariner gave no glance at me, but there was a catch in 
his voice which betokened a twinkle of the eye, as he said 

“Aunt Fay, Miss Van Buren and Miss Rivers, I must in- 
troduce the friend I told you about: our skipper, Jonkheer 
Brederode.” 

Miss Rivers smiled delightfully, with just such a flush of 
ingenuous surprise as I should have liked to see on another 
face. 

“Why, how curious,” she exclaimed, “that you should be 
a friend of Mr. Starr’s ! I think we have almost met Jonkheer 
Brederode before, haven’t we, Nell ?” 

“Have we ?” sweetly inquired Miss Van Buren. “I’m a 
little near-sighted, and I’ve such a wretched memory for 
faces. Unless I notice people particularly, I have to be intro- 
duced at least twice before it occurs to me to bow.” 

“Oh, but, Nell , ” protested Miss Rivers. “Surely you know 
we saw Mr. — no, Jonkheer Brederode — with your cousin 
at the Museum in Delft, and then afterwards you ” 

“People’s clothes make so much difference,” remarked Miss 
Van Buren. 

“Oh, but I wasn’t thinking of your sea adventure, so much 
as when Jonkheer Brederode rode in the contest ” 

“I’m afraid I was looking at the horses,” cut in her step- 
sister. 

If Robert had been on board at this juncture he would 
probably have wished to box his cousin’s ears, but I had no 
such desire, though mine were tingling. In fact, I should have 
enjoyed boxing Robert’s; for I saw that, with the best inten- 
tions in the world (and intentions are dangerous weapons!), 
my too-loyal friend had in some way contrived to make me 
appear insufferable. Perhaps he’d given the impression that 
I had boasted an intention to meet her within a given time, 
and she took this for my brutal way of carrying out the 
boast. 


m THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“What is a Jonkheer ?” the 'pseudo Lady MacNairne de- 
manded of Starr. 

“I don’t know exactly,” he admitted. 

“ Don't you ? But, nephew dear, how can you help know- 
ing, when you have an old friend who is one ?” 

(Was there a spice of malice in this question ?) 

“You see, almost ever since I’ve known him, I’ve thought 
of him as Alb, ” Starr explained hastily. “Alb is a kind of — 
er — pet name.” 

“I suppose it means something nice in Dutch,” said Miss 
Rivers, in the soft, pretty way she has, which would fain make 
every one around her happy. “But I think Mr. van Buren 
told us that ‘Jonkheer’ was like our baronet; Jonkheer in- 
stead of ‘Sir, ’ isn’t it ?” 

“Something of the sort,” I answered. 

“It sticks in the throat, if you’ll excuse me for saying so, 
like a bit of crust,” remarked Aunt Fay. 

“You can all call him Alb,” said Starr. 

“Why not compromise with Skipper ?” asked Miss Van 
Buren, looking at my yachting-cap (rather a nice one) with 
serene impertinence. “We shall probably never have the plea- 
sure of knowing him on land, so why stumble over Dutch 
names or titles ? He has come on board ‘ Lorelei’ to be our 
skipper, hasn’t he ? So he would probably prefer to be called 
‘Skipper.’” 

Starr leaned down to pat Tibe, shaking all over. “Ha, ha, 
ha!” he gasped. “I never saw such a funny tail; I do hope 
it isn’t going to give me hysterics.” 

But nobody else laughed, and Miss Rivers was gazing at 
her stepsister in a shocked, questioning way, her violet eyes 
saying as plainly as if they spoke 

“My darling girl, what possesses you to be so rude to an 
inoffensive foreigner ?” 

I should have liked to ask the same question, in the same 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 125 
words; but I said nothing, did nothing except turn the wheel 
with the air of that Miller who grinds slowly but exceedingly 
small, and smile a hard, confident smile which warned the 
enemy 

“Oh yes, you are going to know me on land, and love me 
on land, so you might as well make up your mind to what has 
to come.” 

She caught the look, which forcibly dragged hers down 
from my hat-brim, and I am convinced that she read its 
meaning. It made her hate me a degree worse, of course; 
but what is an extra stone rolled behind the doors of the 
resisting citadel, or a gallon more or less or boiling oil to dash 
on the heads of the besiegers ? If they are determined, it 
comes to the same thing in the end. 

Fortunately for the spirits of the other players who were 
“on” in this scene (in a subordinate capacity), the fair Enemy 
was not of the nature to sulk. True, of free will she did not 
address me; but having shown her opinion of and intentions 
toward the person deserving punishment, she did not weary 
her arm with continued castigation. Instead, she gave herself 
up heart and soul to delight in her first taste of “botoring.” 
She basked in it, she reveled in it; had she been a kitten, I 
think she would have purred in sheer physical enjoyment of it. 

“My boat! My boat /” she repeated, lingering over the 
words as if they had been cream and sugar. “Oh, I wonder 
if it knows it’s My Boat ? I wish it could. I should like it 
to get fond of me. I know it’s alive. Feel its heart beat. What 
Tibe is to Lady MacNairne, * Lorelei ’ is going to be to me. 
We never lived before, did we, Phil ? And aren’t you glad 
we came ? Who knows what will become of us after this, 
for we certainly never can go home again and take up life 
where we left it off.” 

“You shan’t. I’ll see to that,” I said to myself; but this 
time she was not looking even at the brim of my cap. Her 


126 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

eyes, luminous with childlike happiness, searched and photo- 
graphed each new feature of river-life that skimmed swiftly 
past us. 

“We might become motor-boat pirates,” she went on. 
“There’d be no anti-climax about that; and I dare say we 
could make a living. We’d hoist the black flag whenever we 
came to a nice lonely stretch of water, with a rich-looking 
barge or two, or a fine country house on shore, and the work 
would begin. Tibe would terrorize our victims. But, speaking 
of the black flag, I see the star-spangled banner floats o’er the 
deck of the free and the cabins of the brave. How charming 
of you to think of putting it there, Mr. Starr ! It would never 
have occurred to me.” 

“It would have been charming, if it had occurred to me,” 
said the Mariner; “but it didn’t.” 

“Perhaps our skipper can explain the mystery,” remarked 
the Chaperon, graciously. 

I smiled. “I happened to have the little silk flag,” said 
I, “and as the owner of the boat is an American, I took the 
liberty of flying her colors from the mast to-day; they went 
up early this morning. But we have another flag with us for 
emergencies — that of my Sailing and Rowing Club, — 
which, when we show it, will give us the right to enter sluices 
— or locks, as you call them — ahead of anything else.” 

“Alb, you have your uses,” observed the Mariner. “Why 
can’t we keep your flag up all the time — under the Stars and 
Stripes ?” 

“It wouldn’t be fair to make use of it except in extreme 
cases,” I said. “All these lighter and bargemen whom we see 
have their living to get. Time’s money to them, while it’s 
pleasure to us. It’s right that they should get through ahead, 
when they’re first comers; but there may be occasions when 
we shall need our advantage; and till then I’ll keep the flag 
up my sleeve, with your permission.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 127 

“I never thought to feel so safe on a motor-boat,” exclaimed 
Miss Rivers. “Since we made up our minds to come — or 
rather Nell made up hers — I’ve added another prayer to those 
I’ve been accustomed to say for years — that we shouldn’t 
blow up, or, if we had to blow up, that we shouldn’t realize 
long enough beforehand to be frightened ; and that we should 
blow into quite little pieces which couldn’t know anything 
about it afterwards. But now I’ve such a peaceful feeling, I 
have to make myself remember that any instant may be my 
last.” 

“I wouldn’t try,” said Miss Van Buren. “I suppose, when 
one thinks of it, worse things could happen to one on a motor- 
boat than in a motor-car, because there’s water all round; 
but it seems so heavenly restful, rather like motoring in heaven 
might be, and no frightened horses, or barking dogs, or street 
children to worry you.” 

“I pity people on steamboats, just as the other day, when 
we motored, I pitied people in stuffy black trains,” said Miss 
Rivers. “But I don’t pity the people on lighters and barges. 
Don’t they look delightful ? I should love to live on that one 
with the curly-tailed red lion on the prow, and the green house 
with white embroidered curtains and flower-pots, and sweet 
little china animals in the windows. It’s called 4 Anna Maria,’ 
and oh, it’s worked by a motor !” 

“Lots of them are, nowadays,” I said. “They’re easy to 
rig up, and save work. I happen to know 6 Anna Maria,’ and 
the lady she’s named after, who lives on board and thinks her- 
self the happiest woman on earth — or water. There she goes, 
on her way to the kitchen, with her baby in her arms. Pretty 
creatures both, aren’t they ?” 

“Pictures!” cried Miss Rivers; and her stepsister, who at 
the moment was being particularly nice to the Mariner (I 
fancy by way of showing the Outcast how nice she can be — 
to others), glanced up from a map of Holland, which Starr had 


128 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

opened, across his knees. “It’s like a very young Madonna and 
Child, painted by a Dutch master. I wish you could intro- 
duce us.” 

“Perhaps I will, when we come back this way,” said I. 
“You shall go on board and have tea with Anna Maria and 
her baby, and the husband too, who’s as good-looking as the 
rest of the family. They would be delighted, and proud to 
show off their floating home, which saved Anna Maria’s 
life.” 

“How ? It sounds like a story.” 

“So it is — a humble romance. Anna Maria’s the daughter 
of a bargeman, and was born and brought up on a barge. 
When she was seventeen and keeping house-boat for her 
father (the mother died when she was a child) the poor man 
had an accident, and was drowned. There wasn’t much money 
saved up for Anna Maria, so the barge was sold, and she had 
to live on dry land, and learn how to be a dressmaker. She 
was as miserable as a goldfish would be if you took it out of 
its*bowl and laid it on the table. In a few months she’d fallen 
into a decline, and though, just at that time, she met a dashing 
young chauffeur, who took a fancy to her pretty, pale face, 
even love wasn’t strong enough to save her. The chauffeur, 
poor fellow, thought there was no flower in the garden of 
girls as sweet as his white snowdrop. He felt, if he could only 
afford to buy a lighter for himself, they might marry, and the 
bride’s life might be saved. But it was out of the question, and 
perhaps the idyl would have ended in tragedy, had he not 
confided his troubles to his master. That master, as it happen- 
ed, had a lighter which he’d fitted up with a motor. He’d 
used it all summer, and got his money’s worth of fun out of it; 
so when he heard the story, he told the chauffeur he would 
give him the thing as it stood, for a wedding present, and it 
must be rechristened ‘ Anna Maria.’ 

“What a lamb of a master! I quite love him!” exclaimed 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 129 
Miss Van Buren, before she remembered that she was talking 
to One beyond the Pale. 

“There wasn’t much merit; he was tired of his toy,” I 
answered carelessly; but I felt my face grow red. 

“I don’t believe it a bit. He just said that,” cried Miss 
Rivers. “I should love him too. Is he a Dutchman ?” 

“I shouldn’t be surprised if he was half English, half 
Dutch, ” remarked Starr, good-naturedly. 

“Or if he was making our wheel go round now,” finished 
Aunt Fay, pulling Tibe’s ear. 

“Oh!” said Miss Van Buren, and buried her nose in the 
map. 

She and Starr were tracing, or pretending to trace, our 
route to Gouda, whither we were going, and where we ex- 
pected to lunch. Hurriedly she threw herself into a discussion 
with him as to whether we were now in the Lek or the Maas. 
Reason said Maas, but the map said Lek, though it was a 
thing, thought the lady, about which there could be no two 
opinions; it must be one or the other. 

As a matter of fact, there are many opinions, and as I knew 
the history of the dispute, after all she had to turn to me, and 
listen. I talked to Starr, and at her, explaining how only 
experts could tell one river from another here, and even ex- 
perts differed. 

“Our waters are split up into so many channels that they’re 
as difficult to separate one from the other as the twisted 
strands in a plait of hair,” said I. “It was like Napoleon’s 
colossal cheek, wasn’t it, to claim the Netherlands for 
France, because they were formed from the alluvium of 
French rivers ?” 

Instantly the Chaperon ceased to admire Tibe’s new and 
expensive collar, and opened a silver chain bag, also glittering 
with newness, which she had in her lap. From this she brought 
forth a note-book of Russia leather, and began to write with a 


130 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

stylographic pen, which had dangled in a gold case on a richly 
furnished chatelaine. This little lady had “done” herself 
well since yesterday. 

“I shall take notes of everything,” she announced. “That 
bit about Napoleon goes down first.” 

“Surely you knew, Aunt Fay,” said the Mariner, with a 
warning in his lifted eyebrows. 

“I don’t know anything about Holland, except that it’s 
flat and wet,” she replied, defying him, as she can afford to do, 
now that, once an aunt, she must be always an aunt, as far as 
this tour is concerned. “It’s not the fashion in my part of 
Scotland for ladies of position to know things about foreign 
countries they’ve not visited. It’s considered frumpish, and 
though I may not be as young as I once was, I am not frump- 
ish.” 

She certainly is not. The real Lady MacNairne does not 
dress as smartly, or have such an air of Parisian elegance as this 
mysterious little upstart has put on since assuming her part. 
Save for the gray hair and the hideous glasses, there could 
scarcely be a daintier figure than that of the Mariner’s false 
Aunt Fay. 

“However,” she went on, “my doctor has recommended 
a tonic, and I shouldn’t wonder if a spice of information 
might be a mental stimulant. Anyhow, I intend to try it, and 
ask questions of everybody about everything. ” 

All this she said with a quaint, bird-like air, and I began to 
be impressed with the curious fascination which emanates 
from this strange, small person. I am in her secret. I know she 
is a fraud, though of all else concerning her I am in ignorance 
— perhaps blissful ignorance. I have none too much respect 
for the little wretch, despite her gray hairs; yet, somehow, I 
felt at this moment that I was on her side. I was afraid that, 
if she asked any favor of me, I should run to do it; and I could 
imagine myself being ass enough to quail before the mite’s 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 131 
Liliputian displeasure. As for Starr, I could see that he 
dared not say his soul was his own, if she laid claim to it. 
He might raise his eyebrows, or telegraph with his eyelids, but 
a certain note in that crisp, youthful-sounding voice, would 
reduce him to complete subjection, in what our German cou- 
sins call an augenblick. No wonder that Tiberius — who 
looks as if he could play lion to her martyr without a single 
rehearsal — fawns, crawls, and wriggles like the merest 
puppy at the lifting of her tiny finger, when she wills — as is 
seldom — to be obeyed by him. All must feel the same queer 
power in the woman, be we dogs or men. 

“Well, I’m glad you got your country back from Napoleon,” 
said Miss Rivers. “Nobody, except the Dutch, could* have 
made it so cozy, so radiantly clean and comfortable. Dear 
little Holland!” 

I laughed. “Dear little Holland! Yes, that’s the way you 
all pet and patronize our Hollow Land, and chuck it under 
the chin, so to speak. You think of it as a nice little toy coun- 
try, to come and play with, and laugh at for its quaintness. 
And why shouldn’t you ? But it strikes us Netherlanders as 
funny, that point of view of yours, if we have a sense of hu- 
mor — - and we have, sometimes ! You see, we’ve a good 
memory for our past. We know what we’re built upon. 

“Think of the making of Holland, though I grant you it’s 
difficult, when you look at this peaceful landscape; but try to 
call up something as different as darkness is to light. Forget 
the river, and the houses, and the pretty branching canals, and 
see nothing but marshes, wild and terrible, with sluggish 
rivers crawling through mud-banks to the sea, beaten back by 
fierce tides, to overflow into oozy meers and stagnant pools. 
Think of raging winds, never still, the howling of seas, and 
the driving of pitiless rains. No other views but those, and no 
definite forms rising out of the water save great forest trees, 
growing so densely that no daylight shines through the black 


132 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

roof of branches. Imagine the life of our forefathers, who fled 
here from an existence so much more dreadful that they clung 
to the mud-banks and fought for them, a never-ending battle 
with the sea. That was the beginning of the Netherlands, as it 
was of Venice, and the fugitives built as the Venetians built, 
on piles, with wattles. If you’ve seen Venice, you’ll often be 
reminded of it here. And what rest have we had since those 
beginnings ? If not fighting the sea, we had to fight Spain 
and England, and even now our battles aren’t over. They 
never will be, while we keep our heads above water. Every 
hour of every day and night some one is fighting to save the 
Netherlands from the fate of Atlantis. While her men fight 
she’s safe; but if they rested, this ‘peaceful, comfortable little 
country’ would be blotted out under the waters, as so many 
provinces vanished under the Zuider Zee in the thirteenth 
century, and others, at other times, have been swept away. ” 

“Do you think our motor-boat could ride on the flood, 
and drag ‘ Waterspin,’ if any of the most important dykes or 
dams happened to burst ?” inquired the Chaperon. “I hope 
so, for what you’ve been saying makes one feel exactly like a 
female member of the Ark party. ” 

Everybody laughed; but her joke pricked me to shame of 
my harangue. 

“Nothing will ‘happen to burst,’ ” I assured her. “We 
Dutch don’t lose our sleep over such ‘ ifs. ’ Every country 
has something to dread, hasn’t it ? Drought in India, earth- 
quakes in Italy, cyclones and blizzards in America, and so on. 
Our menace is water; but then, it’s our friend as well as foe, 
and we’ve subdued it to our daily uses, as every canal we pass 
can prove. Besides, there’s something else we’re able to do 
with it. The popular belief is that, at Amsterdam, one key is 
kept in, the central arsenal which can instantly throw open 
sluices to inundate the whole country in case we should be in 
danger of invasion.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 133 
“But you’d drown your land and yourselves, as well as the 
enemy,” exclaimed Aunt Fay. 

“Better drown than lose the liberty we’ve paid for with so 
much blood. The old spirit’s in us still, I hope, though we 
may seem slow-going, comfort-loving fellows in everyday life. 
When we make up our minds to do a thing, we’re prepared to 
suffer for the sake of carrying it through.” 

Again I met Miss Van Buren’s eyes, and I think she realized 
that I am typically Dutch. 


XI 


R OTTERDAM lay far behind us now. We’d passed 
the busy, crowded water-thoroughfares, as thickly 
lined with barges and lighters as streets with 
houses, and were nearing the point where the river, 
disguised as the Issel, turns with many curves toward Gouda. 
We had a few whiffs from brickfields and other ugly indus- 
tries that scar the banks, but the windings of the Issel bore us 
swiftly to regions of grassy meadows, and waving reeds, 
threatening sometimes to lose us in strange no-thoroughfares 
of water more like separate lakes and round ponds, than the 
flowing reaches of a river. 

Here the despised Albatross was worth his weight in gold. 
In charge of a skipper not familiar with every foot of the water- 
road, “Lorelei” and “Waterspin” would have been aground 
more than once. Even that irresponsible head-among-the-stars 
Mariner guessed at the snares we avoided, and flung me a word 
of appreciation. 

“You’re earning your salt,” said he, “and you shall have a 
little at Gouda.” 

But as to Gouda, a struggle was going on between my 
inclination and my conscience. It was my duty as skipper to 
take “Lorelei” through the town that she might be ready to 
start from the other side after luncheon. There would be de- 
lays at swing-bridges, and time would be lost if the party re- 
mained on board, and tried to see the place afterwards. If I 
trusted Hendrik to act as captain and chauffeur in one, some- 
thing would go wrong, and I should be blamed. Neverthe- 
less, I did not relish the thought of seeing Starr march off in 

134 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 135 
triumph with the ladies while I remained behind to work, and 
lunch on a cheese sandwich. I was tempted to shift responsi- 
bility upon Hendrik’s shoulders to-day, and on other days to 
come; but as we slowed up for the sluice, or lock, something 
inside me would have no self-indulgence. To be sure, I am 
playing my part for a purpose, but while I play it, I must 
play well ; and it was the conscientious captain who advised 
his passengers to get out, told them how to find the best inn, 
and what they were to see when they had lunched. 

“The hotel is in the Markt Platz,” I said, “and you must 
have a good look at the old Weigh House while you’re on the 
spot. It will be your first Weigh House, and it’s really a good 
one, with a splendid relief by Eggers, and a delightful outside 
staircase. Then there’s the Stadhuis, too, and if you care for 
old stained glass, the work of the brothers Crabeth in the 
Groote Kerk — — ” 

“But aren’t you going with us ?” asked Miss Rivers. 

I explained why I could not. 

“Oh dear, and we can’t speak Dutch!” she sighed. “Fancy 
a procession straggling through a strange town, wanting to 
know everything, and not able to utter a word.” 

“Nonsense, Phil, we can get on perfectly w*ell,” said Miss 
Van Buren, mutinous-eyed. “I’ve learned things out of the 
phrase-book. You can’t expect a skipper to be a guide as 
well.” 

This was a stab, and I think it pleased her; but I laughed. 

“I shall often be able to go with you, I hope, Miss Rivers,” 
I said. “In many places the boat will start from the same 
spot where she gets in; then I shall be free and at your ser- 
vice.” 

I had to see them off without me, Miss Van Buren walking 
with Starr; and the only one who threw me a backward 
glance was Tibe. But the task I had before me was easier 
than I expected. There were fewer barges in waiting than on 


136 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

most days. Here and there a tip to a bridge-master (a gulden 
stuck conspicuously in my eye, like a silver monocle, just 
long enough to suggest a different destination) worked won- 
ders, and in an hour I had piloted “Lorelei” through .the water- 
streets of Gouda, ready to take her passengers again on the 
Leiden side. Standing at the wheel, I had eaten a sandwich 
and drunk a glass of beer brought by Hendrik, so there was 
no need to seek food in the town. The others, having finished 
lunch, would have begun sight-seeing, and if I strolled to the 
Groote Kerk, it was just possible I might find something even 
more desirable than the exquisite glass. 

“They’ll have saved the church for the last,” I said to 
myself. “I should like to see her face while she looks at the 
Haarlem window.” 

I could not have calculated more exactly, had we made an 
appointment. As I arrived within sight of the verger’s door, 
I saw the party going in. There was a moment’s pause, and 
then all save one disappeared. That figure was Starr’s, and he 
was left in charge of the dog. 

“Hullo !” he exclaimed, “you’re just in time.” 

“Yes,” said I. “Clever, wasn’t I ?” 

“I mean in time to play with this brute, while I go in. 
He’ll be pleased with the exchange; besides, you’ve seen the 
church and I haven’t.” 

“I’ve never seen it in such companionship.” 

“Callous-hearted Albatross ! You’ll unconsecrate the church 
for Miss Van Buren. Can’t you see she’ll have none of you ?” 

“I shall need the more time to make her change her mind. 
Every minute counts. Au revoir. Don’t let Tibe escape, or 
I pity you with your aunt” 

“I wish he’d jump into the nearest canal. Look here, 
Gouda’s a fraud. We’ve had a loathsome lunch — cold ham 
and pappy bread — with paper napkins, and the whole meal 
served on one plate, by a female even my aunt was afraid 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 137 
of. There isn’t a cow within miles, much less a cow with a 
coat ” 

“Perhaps one may pass while you wait. Ta, ta. Your turn 
will come soon.” And I left him glaring at Tibe and muttering 
threats of revenge against me. 

All the windows of the Gouda church are beautiful, but 
the Haarlem window would warm the coldest heart, and I 
was not surprised to find Miss Van Buren already gazing at 
it, a lovely light streaming through the old glass upon her up- 
lifted face. She is a girl to find out the best things at once, by 
instinct. 

There she stood, lost in delight, and when I, assuming 
more boldness than I felt, walked quietly across the church 
and stopped close behind her, she threw just enough of a 
look at the new-comer to see that it was a tallish man in 
gray. 

“Is that you, Mr. Starr?” she asked; but sure that no 
stranger would approach so near, and believing me at a safe 
distance, she took the answer, for granted. “What a fairyland 
in glass there is in this church !” she went on, joyously. “What 
skies, and backgrounds of medieval castles and towers, and 
what luminous colors. I’d love to be one of those little red 
and yellow men looking out of the tower at the battle go- 
ing on below, among the queer ships wallowing in the crisp 
waves, and live always in that fantastic glass country. I want 
to know what’s inside the tower, don’t you ? Which man will 
you choose to be ?” 

“The one on your right side,” said I, quietly. 

Then she whisked round, and blushed with vexation. 

“That you could never be,” she flung at me, and walked 
away; but I followed. 

“Won’t you tell me why ?” I asked. “What have I done 
to offend you ?” 

“If you don’t know", I couldn’t make you understand.” 


138 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Perhaps it’s you who don’t understand. But you will, 
some day.” 

“Oh, I’ve no curiosity.” 

“Am I spoiling your trip ?” 

“I’m not going to let you.” 

“Thanks. Then you’d better let me help to make it pleas- 
anter. I can, in many ways.” 

“I don’t need help in enjoying Holland. I intend to enjoy 
it every instant, in — in ” 

“Won’t you finish ?” 

“In spite of you.” 

“I vow it shall be partly because of me.” 

“You’re very fond of vowing.” 

Then, at last, I knew where I stood. I knew that Robert 
had said something. 

Into the midst of this crisis dropped Miss Rivers. No doubt 
she had seen the expression on our faces, and intervened in 
pure good-heartedness to snatch me as a brand from the 
burning; for she threw herself into talk about the church, 
crying out against the hideous havoc we Protestants had 
wrought with whitewash and crude woodwork. 

“I’m not Catholic, not a bit Catholic, though I may be 
a little high church; but I couldn't have spoiled everything 
just for the sake of getting a place to worship in, cheap, 
without having to put up a new building. Why, it’s like 
murder /” 

Then my lady flashed out at her unexpectedly, and saved 
me an answer. 

“Where’s your imagination, Phil ? It must have gone wool- 
gathering, or you could put yourself into the place of these 
people and see why they tore away the pictures and statues, 
and hid every bit of color with whitewash. I love beauty, 
but I would have done as they did. Color in churches was to 
them the life-blood of their nearest and dearest, splashed 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 139 
upon the walls. Those statues, those pictured saints they 
pulled down or covered up, had smiled on persecution. They 
had to have a kind of frenzied house-cleaning to get out 
the smell of incense. Oh, I know how they felt when they 
did it, as if I’d been here myself with a broom full of white- 
wash.” 

“Perhaps some ancestress of yours was here, and did some 
sweeping,” said I. But it was a mistake for me to speak. 
She froze in an instant, and suggested that if everybody had 
seen enough, we should go out and give “poor Mr. Starr a 
chance.” 

“I’ll stop and show him the Haarlem window,” said she. 
And I hated Starr. Perhaps that was the state of mind she 
wished to create; at all events her eyes retained the exaltation 
of the whitewashing. Nor should I wonder if those two en- 
joyed the thought that I was kept waiting outside, as much 
as they enjoyed roaming together in “glass country.” 

In any case, they stayed so long that we were able to visit 
a shop near by, and come back, before they reappeared. It 
was a nice shop, where sweets and cakes were sold, especially 
the rich treacle “cookies,” for which Gouda is celebrated. 
There was much gold-bright brass; there were jars and boxes 
painted curiously; and we were served by an apple-cheeked 
old lady in a white cap, whom Miss Rivers and the Chaperon 
thought adorable. We bought hopjes as well as cookies, be- 
cause they wanted to make acquaintance with the national 
sweets of Holland; and afterwards, when Miss Van Buren was 
given some, she pronounced them nothing but “the caramel- 
lest caramels” she had ever tasted. 

She and Starr had developed a pleasant private under- 
standing, which comprised jokes too subtle to be understood 
by outsiders; and as the Mariner and I were shoulder to 
shoulder for a moment on our way back to the boat, he gave 
me a look charged with meaning. 


140 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Who laughs last, laughs best,” he quoted; and inwardly I 
could not but agree, though I shrugged my shoulders. 

Tibe attracted enormous attention in Gouda. As we walked 
along shady streets, lit by the clear shining of canals, children 
ran after us as at Hamlin they ran after the Pied Piper. If for 
one instant the strangers paused to study a beautiful, carved 
door, or to peer into the window of an antiquary’s at blue and 
white jars, or to gaze up at the ferocious head of a Turk over 
a chemist’s shop, or to laugh at a house with window-blinds 
painted in red and white diamonds, a crowd of flaxen heads 
collected round us, little hands fluttered over the dog’s wrink- 
led head as butterflies flit about a clover blossom, baby laugh- 
ter tinkled, and tiny shrieks cut the stillness of the sleeyy, 
summer afternoon. 

It was all so dream-like to Miss Van Buren that she declared 
incredulity in Holland’s real existence. “There is no such coun- 
try,” she said, “and worse than all, I have no motor-boat.” 

Nevertheless, a shape which closely resembled “Lorelei” 
was floating like a white water-lily on a green calyx of canal, in 
the place where I had, or dreamed that I had, left her an hour 
ago. And having assembled on board that white apparition, 
we started, or dreamed that we started for Leiden — a place 
where I hoped to score a point or two with my lady. 

The boisterous wind of the early morning had dropped at 
noon, leaving the day hot and unrefreshed, with no breath of 
air stirring. But on the water, traveling at eight or nine miles 
an hour, we forgot the heavy July heat which on shore had 
burned our faces. They were fanned by a constant breeze of 
our own making which tossed us a bouquet of perfume from 
flowery fields as we slipped by, the only sound in our ears the 
cry of sea-going gulls overhead, and the delicate fluting of the 
water as our bows shattered its crystals among pale, shimmery 
sedges and tall reeds. 

Tiny canals of irrigation wandered like azure veins through 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 141 
a maze of blossoming pink and gold in the sun-bright mea- 
dows, and as far as the most sweeping glance could reach, the 
horizon seemed pinned down to earth with windmills. 

Suddenly the land lay far below the level of the canal, and 
people walking in the main streets of villages, behind the 
dykes, were visible for us only as far as their knees. Quaint 
little houses had sat themselves down close to the water’s edge, 
as if determined to miss no detail of canal gossip; and from 
their bright windows, like brilliant eyes, they watched the 
water with a curious expression of self-satisfaction and con- 
tentment on their painted, wooden faces. On verandas, half 
as big as the houses themselves, the life of the family went on. 
Children played, young girls wrote letters to their lovers; 
mothers busily worked sewing-machines, but saw everything 
that passed on the water; fathers read newspapers, and white- 
haired old grandpapas nodded over long-stemmed pipes. 
Every garden blazed with color; and close-planted rows of 
trees, with their branches cut and trained (as Miss Van Buren 
said) “flat as trees for paper dolls,” shaded the upper windows 
of the toy mansions. 

Little things which were matters of every day for me in 
this country so characteristic of the Netherlands, tickled the 
fancy of the strangers, and kept them constantly exclaiming. 
The extravagantly polished wood of the house doors ; the lift- 
ing cranes protruding from the gables ; the dairymen in boats, 
with their shining pails; the bridges that pivoted round to let 
us pass through; the drawbridges that opened in the middle 
and swung up with leisured dignity; the bridgeman in sorrel- 
colored coats, collecting tolls in battered wooden shoes sus- 
pended from long lines; the dogs (which they call “Spitz” and 
are really Kees) who barked ferociously at our motor, from 
every barge and lighter; the yellow carts with black, bonnet- 
like hoods, from which peasant heads peered curiously out at 
us, from shore; and, above all, the old women or young 


142 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

children with ropes across their breasts, straining to tow 

enormous barges like great dark, following whales. 

“What can Dutchmen be like to let them do it, while they 
loaf on board ?” Miss Van Buren flashed at me, as if I were 
responsible for the faults of all my male countrymen. 

“It isn’t exactly loafing to steer those big barges,” said I. 
“And the whole family take turns, anywhere between the ages 
of ten and a hundred. They don’t know what hard work it is, 
because nobody has told them, and our river people are among 
the most contented.” 

Starr was interested in seeing me salute the men of passing 
craft, and in their grave return of the courtesy. Soon, he 
could imitate my motion, though he exaggerated it slightly, 
letting his arm float gracefully out to full length before it came 
back to his cap, somewhat, as he remarked, “like a lily-stem 
blown by the wind.” When he had got the knack he was en- 
chanted, and every yacht, sail-boat, lighter, and barge had a 
theatrical greeting from him as it slipped silently past, perhaps 
never to be seen again by our eyes. 

“But are they happy ?” he asked. “You never hear bursts 
of laughter, or chattering of voices, as you would in other 
countries. The youngest children’s faces are grave, while as 
for the men, they look as if they were paid so much a day not 
to shed a smile, and were mighty conscientious about earning 
their money. Yet you say they’re contented. ” 

“We Dutch are a reserved people,” I explained, under 
Miss Van Buren’s critical gaze. “We don’t make much noise 
when we’re glad, or sad ; and it takes something funny to make 
us laugh. We don’t do it to hear the sound of our own voices, 
but prefer to rest our features and our minds. ” 

“Some of these bargemen look as if they’d rested their minds 
so much that vegetables had grown on them,” mused Starr, 
which made Miss Van Buren giggle; and somehow I was 
angry with her for finding wit in his small sallies. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 143 

“You’ll discover on this trip that as you treat the Dutch, so 
will they treat you,” I went on. “If you’re impatient, they’ll 
be rude; if you show contempt, they’ll pay you back in the 
same coin ; but if you’re polite and considerate there’s nothing 
they won’t do for you in their quiet way. ” 

“We shall never be rude to any of them, shall w r e, Nell ?” 
said Miss Rivers. 

“Not unless they deserve it,” came back the answer. And 
I knew what Dutchman in particular Miss Van Buren had in 
mind. 

It was about two hours from Gouda when a blaze of color 
leaped from the distant level to our eyes, and everybody cried 
out in admiration for little Boskoop, which in summer is al- 
ways en fete among garlands and bowers of bloom. The 
rhododendrons — that last longer with us than in England, 
like all other flowers — were beautiful with a middle-aged 
clinging to the glory of their youth ; and the tall, straight flame 
of azaleas shot up from every grass-plot against a background 
of roses — roses white, and red, and amber; roses pale pink, 
and the crimson that is purple in shadow. 

Miss Rivers thought she would like to live there, and cul- 
tivate flowers; but I told her that she had better not nego- 
tiate for the purchase of a house, until she had seen the miles 
of blossom at Haarlem. 

We had not kept up our average of speed to nine miles an 
hour; for, though we made ten when the way was clear, and 
no yards of regulation red-tape to get tangled in our steering- 
gear, the custom of these waterways is to slow down near 
villages and in farming country. Besides, we met barges 
loaded to the water’s edge, and had we been going fast our 
wash would have swamped them. As it was, we flung a wave 
over the low dykes, and sent boats moored at the foot of 
garden steps knocking against their landing-stages, in fear at 
our approach. But after Alphen we turned into a green stream. 


144 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

so evidently not a canal that Aunt Fay was moved to ask 

questions. 

Her face fell when she heard it was the Rhine. 

“What, this the Rhine !” she echoed. “It’s no wider than — 
than the Thames at Marlow. I was there last summer ” 

“You stayed with Lady Marchant,” broke in Starr, hastily. 
It was not the first time he had cut her short, and the little 
masquerader bristled under the treatment. 

“Oh yes; that was when you were painting my portrait, 
wasn’t it ?” 

Starr flushed, and I guessed why, remembering his Salon 
success, and recalling that it was his portrait of Lady Mac- 
Nairne which had been exhibited this year. Of course, I had 
been stupid not to put the two facts together, and realize that 
his success and her portrait, must have been one and the same. 

The girls had probably heard of it, and must be asking 
themselves at this moment how a portrait of this little spec- 
tacled thing could have been possible. Cruel Aunt Fay ! Some- 
how, she must have known that the face of her alter ego had 
been painted and exhibited by Starr, and she was enjoying his 
misery, as bad boys enjoy the wrigglings of butterflies on pins. 

In pity I stepped in to the rescue, and began again, before 
a question about the portrait could fall from the lips of Miss 
Rivers, on which I saw it trembling. 

“It’s the Rhine for no particular reason,” I said. “It’s 
quite arbitrary. Farther on it’s the Oude Rhine, farther still 
the Krommer, or Crooked Rhine. But if you think little of 
it here, you’ll despise it at Katwyk, where it’s end is so ig- 
nominious that it has to be pumped into the sea.” 

“I don’t think that ignominious,” said the Chaperon. 
“I suppose it doesn’t choose to go into the sea. It would 
rather rest after its labors and lie down in a pleasant pool, 
to dream about where it rose on the Splugen, or about the 
way it poured out of Lake Constance, and went roaring over 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 145 
the rocks at Schaffhausen to wind on among hilly vineyards 
and ruined castles, past the Drachenfels and Cologne. If they 
choose to pump it against its will, that’s their affair; at least 
that’s how I should feel if I were the Rhine.” 

“How Scotch of you, Aunt Fay!” exclaimed Starr, fer- 
vently; but he looked worried; and I wondered if he had 
told the girls that Lady MacNairne had never been much 
abroad. Evidently her double has traveled, and remembered 
what she saw. I am not curious concerning other people’s 
affairs, but I confess I should like to know something of Aunt 
Fay’s past, for she seems so ignorant of some things, so well- 
informed upon others. 

Suddenly Miss Van Buren looked up from a red book 
which had engaged her attention ever since, at Alphen, we 
turned out of the narrow water-street of the canal into the 
broader thoroughfare of the river. 

“This book explains everything except what you want to 
know!” she complained. “Why can’t it tell what Saint Joris 
is in England ? He must be some saint there, and I saw his 
name over that nice little inn with the garden at Alphen.” 

“St. George,” I said; though she had not asked me. 

“I might have known,” she sighed, “and no doubt the 
Dutch have put the dragon into their language too, stuck full 
of those “i’s” and “j’s,” that make me feel whenever I see 
them in print as if my hair were done up too tight, or my 
teeth were sizes too large for my mouth. ‘ Rijn wijn,’ for in- 
stance. Who would think that meant something sleek and 
pleasant, like Rhine wine ?” 

“Why not ?” I asked. “We pronounce it almost the 
same. ” 

“That’s because you haven’t got the courage of your con- 
victions. You fling the ‘i’s’ and ‘j’s’ about, and then pretend 
they’re not there.” 

“Why, don’t you see that they’re only ‘y’s’ ?” I protested. 


146 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

and really it does appear strange that to foreign eyes they can 

look, when side by side, like separate letters. 

But the Chaperon stopped us. She said that we could find 
enough to do minding our p’s and q’s in life, without quarrel- 
ing over “i’s” and “j’s”; so the argument ended, and the girls 
turned their attention to making tea. 

They did it charmingly, juggling with the contents of a 
tea-basket which Starr brought on deck and placed on a 
little folding- table. Whether Miss Van Buren forgot me or 
not, in dealing out cups when tea was made, at all events she 
pretended to, and reminded by her stepsister, gave me tea 
without sugar. Then, begged for one lump, she absentmind- 
edly dropped in three, while talking with Starr. Robert 
would certainly have been tempted to shake her if he had been 
present at that tea-party. 


XII 


M Y mother sent me to Oxford, because she thought 
that she could take no intelligent interest in any 
young man if he had not had his four years at Ox- 
ford or Cambridge. But afterwards, through loyal- 
ty to my fatherland, I gave myself two at the University of 
Leiden; and as the rooms I lived in there hold memories of 
Oliver Goldsmith, I’ve kept them on ever since. I was twenty- 
four when I said good-by to Leiden, and for the five after- 
years the rooms have been lent to a cousin, studying for his 
degree as a learned doctor of law. Now, I knew it was close 
upon the time for him to take his degree, and I hoped that I 
might be able to show my friends (and one Enemy) a few 
things in my old University town which ordinary tourists 
might not see. 

The tea-things had been washed up, and a discussion of 
plans (from which Miss V an Buren managed to exclude me) 
had ended in no definite conclusion, when I brought “Lorelei” 
into one of the innumerable green canals in Leiden. 

“None of you seem to know what you want to do first, 
last, or in the middle,” I ventured to remark; “so, to save 
time, perhaps you’ll let me offer a few suggestions. I’ve told 
Hendrik to fetch a cab, and he’s gone. When your carriage 
comes, engage rooms at the Levedag Hotel, drive through the 
town, have a glance at the churches, and go to the Stadhuis. 
You’ll like the spire and the fa£ade. They’re both of the 
sixteenth century, when we were prosperous and artistic; and 
over the north-side entrance there’s a chronogram inscription 
concerning the siege. I can’t go, because I want to arrange 

147 


148 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

your evening, which I hope will be a success. But I’ll meet 
you in the Archive Room at the Stadhuis, where you can 
admire the paneling till I come, I won’t keep you waiting 
long; and then I’ll take you over the University Buildings. 
I was there, you know, as a student.” 

By the time this plan was arranged to the satisfaction of 
everybody except that of the person I wished to please, 
Hendrik had arrived with a cab, and five minutes later I was 
free to carry out my scheme for the evening. 

From Gouda I’d sent a wire to my cousin Jan van Hoi, 
asking him to be at home and expecting me between four and 
five, so I felt sure of him. I took all the short cuts (which 
I know as well as I know my hat), and was soon climbing the 
ladder-like stairs of the old house, the top floor of which was 
home to me for two years. 

From those windows Goldsmith looked down on the sleepy 
canal, when he visited a crony who was tenant of the rooms; 
and the door which Goldsmith’s hand often touched was 
thrown open by the present tenant, who must have been list- 
ening for my step. 

To my surprise, he was in wild deshabille , and far out of 
his usual phlegmatic self with excitement. 

“It’s my Promotie Day,” he explained. “I’m just back 
and have got out of my swallow-tail after the final exam. 
I’m due at the Club for the first part of my dinner in a few 
minutes. Had you forgotten, or didn’t you get your card ?” 

I told him that no doubt it was at Liliendaal, or wandering 
in search of me; and when I had slapped him on the back, 
and congratulated him as “Learned Doctor,” I began to 
wonder what I should do, as it was clear he would have no 
time to help me carry out my plans. His Promotie dinner, 
the grandest affair of student life, and the rounding off of it, 
would be in three parts, with various ceremonies in between, 
and would last from now until two or three in the morning. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 149 
However, I told him what I had wanted; to give a surprise 
dinner at his diggings for the party from “ Lorelei,” with him 
to arrange details while I played guide, and to take the part of 
host for us at eight o’clock. Could he suggest any one who 
would look after the thing in his place ? Van Rhonda or 
Douw, for instance ? But van Rhonda and Douw, it seemed, 
were the Paranymphs, or supporters of the newly-made 
Doctor, and their time would be fully taken up in seeing him 
through. All my old friends who were left would be at the 
Promotie dinner, but Jan was sure that my business might be 
safely entrusted to the landlady. She would get flowers, go to 
the hotel to order whatever I wished, and even superintend the 
waiters. 

With this I had to be satisfied, for in the midst of the dis- 
cussion appeared the two Paranymphs, wanting to know what 
kept Jan, and the hero of the day was ruthlessly carried off 
between them. I had to do the best I could; my old landlady 
had not forgotten me, and I was assured that I might depend 
upon her. When I had scribbled a menu, consisting of some 
rather odd dishes, sketched an idea for the table decoration, 
and given a few other hasty instructions, I dashed off to keep 
my appointment at the Stadhuis. On the way I consoled my- 
self with the reflection that it’s an ill wind which blows nobody 
good. I had been bereaved of Jan as a prop, but I might 
make use of him and his friends by-and-by as one of the sights 
of Leiden, and I would take advantage of my knowledge of 
the usual program on such festive nights as this for the bene- 
fit of my friends. 

I arrived at the Stadhuis as the others took their first look 
at the oak in the Archive Room. There was just one other 
room in this most excellent and historic building that I wanted 
Miss Van Buren to see. It was a Tapestry Room, among 
other Tapestry Rooms, of no importance; but I remembered 
her fantastic desire to “live in the stained -glass country,” and 


150 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I recalled a certain tapestry garden in which I felt sure she 
would long to wander. There was a meal of some wonderful 
sort going on in it, and I had been conscious in other days of 
a desire to be a tapestry man and sit with the merry tapestry 
lady smiling there. All tapestry people look incredibly happy, 
for in tapestry etiquette it’s bad form to be tragic. Even their 
battles are comedy battles, as you can see by the faces of the 
war-horses that they have a strong sense of humor; but these 
particular tapestry friends of mine were the gayest I ever met, 
and I wanted Miss Van Buren to make their acquaintance. 

To reach the room, through another also representing a 
tapestry world, we had to perform a dreadful surgical opera- 
tion on the abdomen of a Roman emperor by opening a door 
in the middle of it, and, as the Mariner said, the size of the 
next room gave the same sort of shock that Jonah must have 
had when he arrived in the whale. 

If I had shown her that tapestry garden. Miss Van Buren 
would have feigned indifference; but I left her to Starr, and 
from a distance had the chastened pleasure of hearing her say 
to him the things I should have liked her to say to me. 

Afterwards I swept the party away to the University, pre- 
paring their minds to expect no architectural splendors. 

“Leiden is our most famous university,” I said. “But we 
have no streets of beautiful old colleges, no lovely gardens. 
You see, Oxford and Cambridge are universities round which 
towns have gathered, whereas Leiden was a city long before 
William the Silent gave its people choice, as a reward for 
their heroic defense, of freedom from taxes or a university. 
When they said they’d have the university, the thing was to 
get it. Money wasn’t plentiful, and here was an old monastery, 
empty and ready for use — a building whose simplicity would 
have appealed to William in his later days.” 

It was not until they had this apology well in their heads 
that I ushered them into the bare, red-brick courtyard so full 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 151 
of memories for me, and here I buckled on my armor of de- 
fense. 

“Our universities have produced great men, though they’ve 
given them no Gothic buildings or fairy gardens. Where will 
you find more illustrious names than Scaliger, Grotius, and 
Oliver Goldsmith ? — lots ot others, too. Why, Niebuhr said 
of our old hall that no place is so memorable in the history of 
science. 

Trying to appear impressed, the three ladies, followed by 
Starr, trailed into the building, deserted at this hour; and it 
was the artist’s quick eye that first caught the eccentric merit 
of the famous caricatures lining the staircase. 

Then came the chamber of torture, the “Sweating Room,” 
that bare, whitewashed cell remembered by all Leideners with 
anguish. There I (and thousands before and thousands after) 
had sat to wait my dreaded turn with the professors behind the 
green-baize table in the room next door. There I — among 
those other nerve-shattered ones — had scribbled my name 
and scrawled a sketch or two. “Here sweated Rudolph Bre- 
derode,” read out Miss Rivers, with a sweet look, as if she 
pitied me now for what I suffered then. But Miss Van Buren 
showed sublime indifference. She wished, she said, to pick 
out names that were really interesting# 

Even she, however, was roused to compassion for the 
tortured ones, when in the adjoining room she heard that the 
examinations were conducted publicly, and that there was no 
reason why any stranger should not walk in from the street 
to hear the victims put to the question. 

“It’s good for us,” I said. “Helps us to pluck and self- 
control.” But nobody agreed with me, and it was Miss Van 
Buren’s opinion that none save Dutchmen would stand it. 

The Senate Room, which Niebuhr wrote of, found favor 
in her eyes; but after that there was nothing more to do in the 
University, and it was only six o’clock. There were two hours 


152 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

before the surprise dinner; so, without giving my secret away, 
I said that, if we put off dining until eight, we could see the 
Laeckenhalle, and go up to the Burg at sunset. 

The Laeckenhalle and the Burg were mere names to them, 
as few scraps are thrown to either place by the guide-books; 
but so delighted were they with the carvings on the house of 
the Cloth Spinner’s Guild and the marbles in the courtyard 
that I could hardly get them inside. Once within, Starr made 
Miss Van Buren laugh at the things she ought to have respect- 
ed and linger before the things I hadn’t intended to point out. 

But I was not shocked at her flippant delight in a quaint 
representation of tortures in hell, nor was I stirred by her 
scorn of the stiff siege-pictures, with van der Werf offering 
his arm as food for the starving people, rather than surrender 
to the Spaniards. In spite of her distaste for the painting, how- 
ever, she would not hear me decry van der Werf in favor of an 
obscure engineer, lately discovered as the true hero of the 
siege. Van der Werf should not be snatched from hef by a 
man she chose to detest, so she argued and abused my trea- 
chery during the whole time spent among the relics of the 
siege. She glared at the saucepan retrieved from the Spanish 
camp as if she would have thrown it at my head. She thought 
me capable of denying authenticity to the blocks of taret- 
gnawed wood torn from the dykes when a worm made Hol- 
land tremble as Philip of Spain could never do ; nor would she 
forgive me van der Werf, though I did my best with the tale of 
that time of fear when men, women, and children worked their 
fingers to the bone in restoring what the worm had destroyed, 
and keeping the sea from their doors. 

I never yielded her a point, all the way up to the Burg, for 
at least I was cheating Starr of her. But in the fortress, on the 
ancient mound heaped up by Hengist, I and my opinions were 
forgotten. She wanted to be let alone, and pretend she was a 
woman of Leiden, looking out across the red roofs of the city. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 153 
through the pitiless red of the sunset, for the fleet of rescuing 
barges. 

Nevertheless, she did deign to ask how, if the way had been 
opened for the sea to flood the land, the people coaxed it to 
go back again. And she looked at me as she had looked at 
Starr, while I told how the thing had been done; how the 
w T ater that floated William’s fleet for the relief of the town was 
but two feet in depth; how only a gale from the south at the 
right time sent the waters flowing from the broken dykes 
above Schiedam north as far as Leiden; and how no sooner 
was the city saved than the wind changed, calling back the 
waters. 

From the walls of the fortress we saw the sun go down; 
and then, with Starr in the ascendant again, we strolled 
through quiet streets, crossing bridges over canals spread with 
soft green carpets of moss. But we were not going to the 
hotel ; and without a word about dinner, I asked if they would 
care to see a student’s “diggings.” I had only to add as a 
bribe that Oliver Goldsmith had visited there and carved his 
initials in a heart on the wainscotting, to make them eager to 
climb the steep stairs which led to my Surprise. 

It began by my opening the door at the top with a key — 
instead of knocking. This set them to wondering; but I 
laughed, evading questions, and lured them into an oak-walled 
room, dim with twilight. 

According to instructions, no lamp or candle had been 
lighted, but a glance showed me a large screen wrapped round 
something in a corner, and I knew that I hadn t trusted good 
old Mevrow Hoogeboom in vain. 

Now I struck a match from my own match-box, and as the 
flame flared* up, success number one was scored. It was the 
old-fashioned Dutch lamp-lighter of brass, to which I touched 
the match, that called out the first note of admiration from the 
strangers ; and as I woke up candle after candle, in its quaint 


154 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

brass stick, the first notes rose to a chorus. What a lovely 
room ! What walls, what dear old blue-and-white china beasts, 
what a wonderful fireplace, with handles to hold on by as you 
stood and warmed yourself! What chairs, what chests of 
drawers, what pewter tankards ! If this were a typical room 
of a Leiden undergraduate, the Leiden undergraduates were 
lucky men. 

I had to explain that it was hardly fair to call it typical; 
that only a man with money and a love for picking up old 
things would have quarters like these; still, the lodgings were 
typical of Leiden. 

When the ladies had exhausted their adjectives, they grew 
curious concerning their host. I told them that the man was 
absent, because this happened to be the night of his Promotie 
dinner, but that I was free to do the honors. 

“Well, I’m sick with envy of the fellow,” said Starr, “and 
I for one daren’t trust myself any longer, especially on an 
empty stomach, among his pewters and blue beasts and brass- 
es. We’d better go away and have dinner.” 

“You needn’t go away,” said I, jerking an old-fashioned 
bell-rope, and drawing the screen aside. Behind it, was what 
I had hoped would be there — a table laid for five, with plenty 
of nice glass and silver, and banked with pink and white roses. 
As everybody exclaimed at the sight, an inner door opened 
and two waiters from the Levedag, who had been biding their 
time for my signal, appeared in answer to the bell. 

“It’s black magic,” said Aunt Fay. “I believe these men 
are genii, and you’ve got the lamp in your pocket. How I 
wish I hadn’t left Tibe at the hotel. He would have loved 
this, poor darling. ” 

“Dinner is served, sir,” announced one of the genii; and 
laughing, I offered the Chaperon my arm. 

“But it can't be for us,” objected Miss Rivers. 

“It’s for no one else,” said I. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 155 

“How can we eat the man’s things, when he’s never seen 
us, and we’ve never seen him ?” Miss Van Buren appealed to 
Starr. But it was I who answered. 

“You see him now,” I confessed. “These are my rooms. 
I lend them to my cousin, but I’ve kept the right to use them. 
As for the dinner, it’s my dinner, and it will be a humiliation 
to me if you refuse to eat it. ” 

These words were meant for her, and I looked straight at 
her as I spoke, so there could be no mistake. Red sprang to 
her cheeks. She bit her lip, and what she would have answered 
or done if left to herself I shall never know, for Miss Rivers 
slipped one arm coaxingly within the arm of her stepsister, 
and said, with a laugh, to make it seem that all three were 
jesting — 

“Why, of course she won’t refuse. None of us would for- 
give her for spoiling our pleasure. Come along, Nell.” 

So Nell did “come along,” like the sweet and sensible girl 
she really is, when she has not been driven to defiance by 
blundering young men; and we sat down to eat the best 
dinner that Leiden could provide at short notice. Nothing 
that was truly Dutch had been forgotten, but the most bril- 
liant success was not the plat on which the chef would have 
staked his reputation. It was nothing more nor less than the 
dish with which all Leiden invariably occupies itself on the 
3rd of October, anniversary of blessed memory. On that day 
it was, three hundred and thirty odd years ago, that a little 
boy ran joyously home from a flying visit to the deserted 
Spanish camp, with a pot of carrots and potatoes mixed to- 
gether in a hotch-potch; therefore, with hotch-potch does 
Leiden to this hour celebrate the Great Relief, eating with 
thanksgiving. 

And my guests ate with compliments, enjoying the idea if 
not the food, as if they had been Leideners. Last of all, we 
had grilled herrings with mustard, on toasted bread, a quaint 


156 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

conceit which I had to explain by telling how, on the 3rd of 
October, bread and herrings are still distributed to the poor, 
because it was with herrings and bread that the Dutch boats, 
coming to the relief of Leiden, were loaded. 

I managed to keep the party long at the table, and when 
the Chaperon proposed going, I looked at my watch, counsel- 
ing patience for half an hour. 

“If you’ll wait,” I said, “I’ll show you something rather 
special on the way home — something that can’t be seen by 
everyone.” 

Then I told about my cousin; how this was his great day, 
and how, without being invited, we could share the fun. I told 
how, early this morning, Jan’s Paranymphs had donned eve- 
ning dress, according to old custom, and driven in smart car- 
riages (the horses’ heads nodding with plumes) to the railway 
station to meet their principal’s father, mother, sisters, and 
pretty cousins; how the party had then come to these rooms, 
where Jan had received them, half shamefaced in his “swal- 
low-tail”; how, not long before we arrived at the University, 
Jan had gone through his torture in the “sweating-room,” and 
before the examiners with his relatives present; how the 
ladies, after seeing the town, had been ungallantly packed 
off home, before the best fun began. How Jan had returned, 
to cast away his evening things at the time when most people 
think of putting them on, and rush to the Students’ Club in 
morning dress. How his Paranymphs and friends had met 
him, and at a big round table — soon to be covered with 
glasses — the Professors’ servant (called “Pedel” of the Un- 
iversity) had handed the new Doctor his official appointment, 
in return for a fee of ten gulden. How the dinner had begun in 
speech-making and music, with an adjournment after the 
first part, to the garden for coffee, liqueurs, and cigars; how, 
when the table had been cleared and rearranged, everybody 
had marched back to risk their lives by eating lobster and 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 157 
quantities of indigestible things. How Jan would then have 
had to make his “palaver,” thanking his friends for their 
speeches in his honor; and how, while he was speaking, the 
waiters would be placing a large napkin at the plate of each 
man — a mere napkin, but destined for an outlandish pur- 
pose. “By this time,” I went on mysteriously, “those napkins 
are fulfilling their destiny, and if you would like to see what it 
is, you’ve only to follow me.” 

They were on their feet in an instant. We scrambled down 
the narrow stairs, and out into the starlit night. Leiden was a 
city of the dead. Not even a dog played sentinel for the sleep- 
ing townsfolk; not a cat sprang out of the shadows as I led 
my band through a labyrinth of canal-streets, floored as if 
with jet nailed down with stars. But suddenly the spell of 
silence was broken by an explosion of sound which crashed 
into it like breaking glass. A brassy blare of music that could 
not drown young men’s laughter, burst on us so unexpectedly 
that the three ladies gave starts, and stifled criefe. I stopped 
them at a corner, and we huddled into the shadow, flattened 
against a wall. 

“The Napkins are coming!” I said, and I had not got the 
words out before the blue darkness was aflame with the red 
light of streaming torches, a wild light which matched the 
band music. There was a trampling of feet, and in the midst of 
smoke and ruddy flare sequined with flying sparks, came 
torch-bearers and musicians, led by one man of solemn coun- 
tenance, holding in both hands a noble Nougat Tart — the 
historic, the indispensable Nougat Tart. Then, with a mea- 
sured trot that swung and balanced with the music, followed 
the Napkins, wound turban-fashion round the heads of their 
wearers, and floating like white banners with the breeze of 
motion. First came a Paranymph thus adorned, then the learn- 
ed Doctor holding fast to the leader’s coat-tails; behind him 
the second Paranymph, and clinging to his coat the hero’s 


158 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

father, with the whole procession of turbaned friends tailing 

after. 

They swept by us as a comet sweeps down the sky, and 
concerned themselves with our group against the wall no 
more than a comet does with such humble stars, dusting the 
outskirts of the Milky Way, as shrink from his fiery path. 

“A vision of goblins,” said the Mariner, when he had got 
his breath. 

“What fun! But why do they do it?” asked Miss Rivers. 

“Why? I’m sure I don’t know,” I laughed, “except be- 
cause they always have, and I suppose always will, while 
there’s a university at Leiden. That’s all we’ll see, but it isn’t 
all there is to see. By-and-by the procession will go prancing 
back to the Club, where the next thing will be to get over the 
big reading-table, then over the buffet of the bar, without once 
breaking the chain of coat-tails, through passages and kit- 
chens to the club-room once more, where the chain will be 
split up, but where the chairs in which the men will sit to 
drink champagne and eat the Nougat Tart, must be on the 
tables and not round them.” 

“And will that be the end ?” inquired the Chaperon, who 
ever thirsts with ardor for information. 

“Not nearly,” said I. “The third part of dinner will be due, 
and every one’s bound to eat it, even those whose chairs have 
fallen off from the pyramids of small tables, and whose heads 
or bones have suffered. They’ll have dessert; and at dawn 
the best men will be taking a country drive.” 

“I begin to understand,” said Starr, “how your people ' 
exhausted the Spaniards. Good heavens, you could wear 
out the Rock of Gibraltar ! And I see why, though you can 
eat all day and all night too, you don’t put on fat like your 
German cousins.” 

“When we begin a thing, we Dutchmen see it through,” I 
replied modestly. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 159 

“So do we Americans,” remarked Miss Van Buren. 

“I wonder which would win if the two interests were op- 
posed ?” I hazarded, a propos of nothing — or of much. 

“I should bet on America, ” said she. 

“I don't bet,” I returned, with all the emphasis I dared 
give; though perhaps it was not enough to tear up a deep- 
rooted impression; albeit the seed had been sown for but 
four-and-twenty hours. 

So ended the lesson for the first day. 

It was not an easy lesson for me. But I regret nothing. 


XIII 


‘ 4 "W" OOK here, ” said the Mariner next morning, rap- 
ping on my door at the hotel, “how soon could we 
J start for Katwyk ? ” 

“I thought the expedition was given up,” I an- 
swered, “as nobody spoke of it last night.” 

“Not in your presence, but my worthy aunt rejoices in a 
sitting-room, and we met there — some of us — to discuss the 
expedition. The girls think they’re keen to go, but it’s a case 
of hypnotism. She wants a thing, and in some curious way, 
known only to herself, she gives others the impression that 
they are wanting it frantically.” 

“I’ve noticed that,” said I. 

“Oh, you have ? Well, she’s a wonderful woman. I daren’t 
dwell upon the things she’s got out of me already, or ask my- 
self what she’ll get before the play’s finished. That sitting- 
room, for instance. I suppose it will end in her always having 
one. Did you observe Tibe’s collar ? It cost twenty-five dollars, 
and the queer part is that I offered it to her. I thought at the 
time I wanted him to have it. Now, I ask you, as man to man, 
is it canny ? And she has a traveling-bag with gold fittings. I 
presented it under the delusion that I owed it to her as my — 
temporary relative. Heavens, where is this to end ? Not at 
Katwyk, with the Rhine. But we’ve got to go there. Anything 
to please her. ” 

Strange to say, the hypnotic influence must have stolen 
up from her ladyship’s room on the floor below, and along 
the corridor to mine, for I found myself thinking: “She 
rather likes me, and can be useful, if she dominates the 

160 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 161 
two girls in this way. I must do my best to keep her on my 
side.” . 

No doubt this was the form the influence took, but I made 
no struggle against it. On the contrary, I assured Starr that 
the expedition to Katwyk would be a good expedition; that I 
would be dressed in ten minutes; that I didn’t mind about 
breakfast, but would have a cup of coffee with Hendrik; that 
if the party came on board “Lorelei” in half an hour, they 
would find her ready. 

“All right, I’ll tell them,” said he. “I did want to stop and 
see a few pictures, for it seems a burning shame to leave 
the town where Gerard Douw, and Steen, and lots of other 
splendid chaps were born, without worshiping at their shrines, 
but ” 

“They’re rather bare shrines at Leiden,” I consoled him. 
“You’ve seen much better specimens of their work elsewhere. 
You’d be disappointed.” 

“Just as well to think so. I’ll give your message; but as 
there are three ladies and one dog, you’d better expect us when 
3 r ou see us. ” 

In spite of this fact I had little time to spare, though it ap- 
peared that en route to the boat a delay was caused by Tibe 
jumping into a cab with two elderly ladies from Boston, who, 
so far from reciprocating his overtures, nearly swooned with 
terror, and had to be soothed and sustained by the entire 
party. 

The canal that leads from Leiden to Katwyk-aan-Zee 
passes the houses of Descartes and Spinoza; and altogether 
the short journey by water did not lack interest, for Katwyk 
has become a colony of artists. Once there, we walked to the 
sluice where the Rhine seeks its grave in the North Sea; and 
as it happened that the tide was high, with a strong shore 
wind, I could show the Cyclopean defenses of our coast at 
(heir best. With the secret pleasure which I believe all men 


162 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

take in pointing out things to women, I explained the great 
series of gates through which the river passes to its death. All 
were closed against the raging waves, which leaped and bel- 
lowed, demanding entrance, rearing their fierce heads twelve 
feet or more above the level where the Rhine lay dying. 
When the tide should turn, and the wild water retreat, the 
sluice-gates would be opened, and the river would pour sea- 
ward, sweeping away the masses of sand piled up in fury by 
the cheated waves. 

We lunched on board the “Lorelei,” I munching abjectly on 
deck, on duty at the wheel, while from the cabin below came 
to my ears the tinkling of girls’ laughter, and the merry pop- 
ping of corks. In theory I was better off than Tantalus, for Tan- 
talus had no beer or sandwiches; but, on the other hand Tan- 
talus was not in love with a girl whose voice he could hear 
mingling with his rival’s; so practically there was not much to 
choose. 

Luckily I had not to bear the strain for long. I did my best 
yesterday, in talking of Haarlem, to awaken interest in the 
huge Haarlemmer-meer Polder, and its importance in the 
modern scheme of the Netherlands. Now my eloquence was 
rewarded, for they hurried through their luncheon, not that 
they might cheer the skipper’s loneliness, but that they might 
miss no feature in the landscape. 

We were skirting one side of the green plain which has 
been reclaimed from the water, converting the meer into a 
“polder.” Our canal flowed many feet above the level of the 
surrounding land, so that we looked down upon men tilling, 
upon white-sailed boats cutting through miniature waterways 
as if they navigated meadows, and upon cows grazing knee- 
deep in mist, which rose like blowing silver spray, over the 
pale-green waves of grass. 

These black-and-white cattle, according to Miss Van 
Buren, form the upper circles of the cow-world in Holland. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 163 
Not only do they live up to their traditions by being cleaner 
and sleeker than the cows of other countries, but they know 
themselves to be better connected than the mere red-and- 
white creatures with whom they are occasionally forced to 
share a meadow. To show that they understand what is due to 
their dignity, they refuse to talk with the common herd, and 
stand with their backs to any red-and-white nonentity that 
may presume to graze near, conversing among themselves in 
refined monotones with the air of saying, “Who was she ?” 

There’s little in the history of the Netherlands which Miss 
Van Buren does not know, for she is proud of her Dutch 
blood, though she won’t say so before me. The others are 
frankly ignorant; but the Chaperon has read a book of Rider 
Haggard’s called “Lysbeth,” and was deeply interested in the 
Haarlemmer-meer, where the “treasure” of that story lay hid; 
but it was news to her that the great inland sea had once sent a 
destructive flood to the gates of Amsterdam, and that as pun- 
ishment it had been drained away. Miss Van Buren — whom 
I think of as “Nell” — knew all this, including the very day in 
1840 when the work was begun, and how many months the 
pumps had taken to drink the monstrous cup dry; but the 
mysterious little lady who rules us all, and is ruled by Tibe, 
expected to find the Haarlemmer-meer still a lake, and was 
disappointed to learn the meaning of “polder.” She thought 
thirty-nine months too long for draining it, and was sure that 
in America (where she quickly added that she had “once 
been”) they would have done the work in half the time. 

Every one fell in love with the outskirts of Haarlem, as 
“Lorelei” swam into the River Spaarne. Though the glory of 
the tulips was extinguished (like fairy-lamps at dawn) three 
months ago, the flowers of summer blazed in their stead, a 
brilliant mosaic of jewels. 

“The Dutch don’t seem a nation to have gone mad over 
a tulip; but perhaps they were different in the seventeenth 


164 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

century,” said Miss Rivers, looking at me, as if I stood to re- 
present my people. 

“And the English don’t seem the kind to have lost their 
heads over a South Sea Bubble, but they did,” retorted Nell, 
as if she were defending us. 

They liked the houses along the river-side, houses big and 
little, which look as if the front and back walls of their lower 
stories had been knocked out, and the space filled in with 
glass. They were amused by the rounded awnings over the 
balconies, which Nell likened to the covers of giant babies’ 
perambulators; and they laughed at the black-painted doors 
picked out with lines of pale green, which contrasted with a 
whitewashed fa 9 ade. 

At Haarlem I had another surprise for them, which I ar- 
ranged before leaving Rotterdam. It was one which would 
cost nothing in trouble, little enough in money, and would 
give pleasure to everybody — except to my chauffeur, who is 
in love with my mother’s French maid, and no doubt was 
reveling in the thought of a long holiday at Liliendaal. 

When I’d brought “Lorelei” through the bridge, and hove 
her to by the broad quay, there stood close at hand a hand- 
some, dark-blue motor-car. 

“What a beauty!” exclaimed Nell. “That’s much grander 
than Robert’s.” Then she glanced at me. “I beg your par- 
don,” said she, demurely. “I’m afraid the car my cousin has 
is yours.” 

“So is this,” said I. 

“Dear me, what is Dr doing here?” she demanded, sorry 
to have praised a possession of the enemy’s. 

“It’s waiting to take you round Haarlem,” I replied. “I 
thought it would be a nice way for you to see the place, as the 
suburbs are its speciality, so to speak, and motoring saves 
time.” 

“You’re a queer chap, Alb,” remarked the Mariner. “You 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 165 

have such a way of keeping things up your sleeve, and spring- 
ing them on one. You ought to be called ‘William the Silent/ ” 

“Why, that’s what he is called, didn’t you know ? Mr. van 
Buren told us,” exclaimed Phyllis, and ended up her sentence 
with a stifled shriek which could have meant nothing but a 
surreptitious pinch. 

I would not have glanced at either of the girls for anything; 
but I would have given something to know how Nell was 
looking. 

“Have you any more belongings here ?” asked the Cha- 
peron, gaily. “Such as an ancestral castle, where you could 
give us another surprise feast ?” 

I laughed. “As a matter of fact, I have an ancestral castle 
in the neighborhood. It isn’t mine, but it was my ancestors’, 
and if I can’t exactly entertain you in it, I can give you tea 
close by at a country inn. Perhaps you’ve read about the 
Chateau of Brederode, within a drive of Haarlem 

I saw by Nell’s face that she had, but she was the only one 
who did not answer, and the others hadn’t informed them- 
selves of its existence. 

Hendrik, helped by my chauffeur, got out the small luggage 
which is kept ready for shore duty — the Chaperon’s splendid- 
ly-fitted dressing-bag making everything else look shabby — 
and the five of us (six with Tibe) got into the car, I taking the 
driver’s seat. 

The streets of Haarlem being too good to slight, I drove 
leisurely toward the heart of the old town, meaning to en- 
gage rooms and leave all belongings at the quaint Hotel Funek- 
ler, which I thought they would like better than any other; but 
passing the cathedral, Miss Phyllis begged to stop, and I 
slowed down the car. After Gouda’s wonderful glass, they 
would have found the Haarlem church disappointing, had it 
not been for the two or three redeeming features left in the 
cold, bare structure; the beautiful screen of open brass-work, 


166 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

with its base of dark wood, on which brightly-painted, mystic 
beasts disport themselves among the coats-of-arms of divers 
ancient towns; and the carved choir-stalls. 

Nell and the Mariner were so fascinated by a wooden 
gentleman wearing his head upside down, and a curiously 
mixed animal carrying its offspring in a cloak, that I found 
time to send secretly for the organist; and before my friends 
knew what was happening, the cold white cathedral was 
warmed and lighted too, by such thrilling music as few organs 
and few organists can make. 

When it was over, and only fleeting echoes left, Miss Rivers 
came and thanked me. 

“That was your thought, of course,” said she. “None of 
us will ever forget.” 

My chauffeur had kept Tibe, and when we reappeared, was 
surprised in the act of fitting a pair of spare goggles on to the 
dog. Aunt Fay was delighted with the effect, and a photo- 
graph was taken before we were allowed to start, though time 
was beginning to be an object. But, as the Chaperon cheer- 
fully remarked, “Tibe and tide wait for no man.” 

“What does ‘groote oppruiming’ mean, written up every- 
where in the shops ?” she inquired eagerly, as the car flashed 
through street after street. 

I told her that in a Dutch town it was equivalent to the 
“summer sales” in London, and she seemed satisfied, though 
I doubt if she knows more of London than of Rotterdam. 
But she and the girls wanted everything that they saw in the 
show windows, and I found that, before we left Haarlem, the 
Mariner’s purse would again be opened wide by the hypnotic 
spell of Aunt Fay. 

In a thirty horse-power car we were not long on the way out 
to Brederode, though I took her slowly through the charming 
Bloemendaal district, giving the strangers plenty of time to 
admiie the quaintly built, flower-draped country houses half 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 167 
drowned in the splendid forest where Druids worshiped once, 
and to find out for themselves that the dark yellow billows in 
the background were dunes hiding the sea. 

We left the car in front of the shady inn, and ordered coffee 
to be ready when we should come back — coffee, with plenty 
of cream, and a kind of sugared cake, which has been loved 
by Haarlemers since the days when the poor, deluded ladies 
of the town baked their best dainties for the Spaniards who 
planned their murder. 

It was natural to play guide on the way to the dear old 
copper and purple and green -gold ruin, ivy-curtained from 
the tower roofs to the mossy moat. 

This was my first visit to the place for a year or two, and I 
longed to take the One Girl apart, to tell her of my fantastic 
ancestor, the Water Beggar, of whom I am proud despite his 
faults and eccentricities; to recall stories of the past; the 
origin of our name “Brede Rode,” broad rood; how it, and the 
lands, were given as a reward, and many other things. But 
instead, I made myself agreeable to the Chaperon, and saved 
Tibe on three separate occasions from joining the bright 
reflections and the water-lilies in the pond. 

I sat by Nell at a table afterwards, however, and she had to 
pour coffee for me, because she was doing that kind office 
for the rest; and as the sugar tongs had been forgotten, she 
popped me in a lump of sugar with her own fingers before she 
stopped to think. Then, she looked as if she would have liked 
to fish it out again, but, being softer than her heart, it had 
melted, and I got it in spite of her. 

We drove back through the forest in a green, translucent 
glimmer, like light under the sea, and there was little time to 
dress for dinner when I brought them to anchor for the night. 
The nice old hotel, with its Delft plates half covering the 
walls, its alcoves and unexpected stairways with green bal- 
usters, and its old dining-room looking on a prim garden, 


168 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

pleased the eyes which find all things in Hollow Land in- 
teresting. 

It was a long dinner, with many courses, such as Dutch- 
men love; still, when we finished, daylight lingered. In the fan- 
tastic square with its crowding varieties of capricious Dutch 
architecture, the cathedral was cut black and sharp out of a 
sky of beaten gold, and Coster’s statue wore a glittering halo. 
Under their archways of green, the canals were on fire with 
sunset, their flames quenched in the thick moss which clothed 
their walls; the red-brown color of paved streets, and the 
houses with their pointed facades in many steps, burned also, 
as if they were made of rose-and-purple porphyry instead of 
common bricks, while each pane of each window blazed like a 
separate gem. 

It was a good ending to a good day, and though I had ac- 
complished nothing definite, I was happy. 

Next morning I had the car ready early, and took every 
one for a spin through the Hout, which reminded them of the 
Bois, or what the Bois would be if pretty houses were scattered 
over it like fallen leaves. 

We stopped in Haarlem after that last spin only long enough 
to do reverence to Franz Hals, and the collection of his work 
which is the immediate jewel of the city’s soul. 

It was pretty to watch Nell scraping acquaintance with the 
bold, good-humored officers and archers, and bland municipal 
magnates whom Hals has made to live on canvas. She looked the 
big, stalwart fellows in the eye, but half shyly, as a girl regards a 
man to whom she thinks, yet is not quite sure, she ought to bow. 

“Why, their faces are familiar. I seem to have known them,” 
I heard her murmur, and ventured an explanation of the 
mystery, over her shoulder. 

“You do know them,” I said. “Their eyes are using the 
eyes of their descendants for windows, every day in the streets. 
Holland isn’t making new types.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 169 

She turned to look me up and down, with a flicker of long 
lashes. Then she sighed 

“What a pity!” 

Perhaps I deserved it, for I had brought it on myself. 
Nevertheless, sweet Phyllis pitied me. 

“What surprise have you got for us next, Sir Skipper ?” she 
asked brightly. “Mr. Starr says that no day will be complete 
without a surprise from you; and we depend upon you for our 
route as part of the surprise. ” 

“I thought Mr. Starr was making out our route,” remarked 
Nell to a tall archer of Franz Hals. 

“If I’ve contrived to create that impression, I’ve been 
clever,” said the Mariner. “In fact, I would have preferred 
you to think me responsible, as long as the route proved satis- 
factory. Of course, whenever anything went wrong, I should 
have casually let drop that it was Alb’s idea. But, as you 
mention the subject in his presence, I must admit that he has 
made several suggestions, and I’ve humored him by adopting 
them, subject to your approval. 

“Does the name of Aalsmeer convey anything to your 
minds ?” I asked. But all shook their heads except Nell, who 
appeared absorbed in making a spy-glass of her hand, through 
which to gaze at her jolly archer. 

“Then it shall be this day’s surprise,” I said. “I won’t 
tell you anything; but you needn’t be ashamed of ignorance, 
for all the world is in the same boat, and you won’t find Aals- 
meer in guide-books. Yet there isn’t a place in the Nether- 
lands prettier or more Dutch.” 

“Good-by, Franz Hals, perhaps forever. We leave you to seek 
pastures new, ” said Starr. “Come along, Miss Van Buren. ” 

So she came, and I drove them in the car to the quay, 
where I directed my chauffeur to go on to Amsterdam, and be 
ready to report for order at the harbor of the Sailing and 
Rowing Club. 


XIV 


T HERE is nothing remarkable in the broad canal 
that connects Haarlem with Amsterdam, and when 
we had started, Miss Van Buren read aloud to the 
assembled party. Her book was Motley, and the 
subject that siege which, though it ended in tragic failure, 
makes as fine music in history as the siege of Leiden. Mean- 
while, as she read, we skimmed through the bright water, 
which tinkled like shattered crystals as we broke its clear 
mirror with our prow. 

There were few houses along shore, but far in the distance, 
seen across wide, flat expanses, shadow villages and tapering 
spires were painted in violet on the horizon — such a shim- 
mering horizon as we of the lowlands love, and yearn for when 
we sojourn in mountain lands. At Halfweg, a little cluster of 
humble dwellings, I turned out of the main canal, skirting the 
side of the Haarlemmer-meer Polder, opposite to that which 
we had followed yesterday. 

“When is the surprise coming ?” asked Phyllis at last, her 
curiosity piqued by the slowness of progress in this small 
canal. 

“Now,” said I, smiling, as I stopped at an insignificant 
landing-place; “this is where we go on shore to find it.” 

“Methinks, Alb, you are playing us false,” said the Mariner. 
“You’re about to lead us into a trap of dulness.” 

“I’ve a mind to stop on board and finish the chapter,” said 
Nell. 

“You’ll repent it if you do,” I ventured. Yet I think she 
would have stayed if her stepsister had not urged. 

170 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 171 

We walked along an ordinary village street for some dis- 
tance; it was dusty and unbeautiful. Even Miss Rivers had 
begun to look doubtful, when suddenly we came in sight of a 
toy fairyland — a Dutch fairyland, yet a place to excite the 
wonder even of a Dutchman used to living half in, half out of 
water. 

From where the party stopped, arrested by the curious 
vision, stretched away, as far as eyes could follow, an earthern 
dyke, bordered on either hand by a lily-fringed toy canal, just 
wide enough for a toy rowboat to pass. Beyond the twin, toy 
canals — again on either hand — was set a row of toy houses, 
each standing in a little square of radiant garden, which was 
repeated upside down in the sky-blue water, not only of the 
twin canals, but of the still more tiny, subsidiary canals which 
flowed round the flowery squares, cutting each off from its 
fellow. 

Tibe, delighted with Aalsmeer and a dog he saw in the dis- 
tance, darted along the straight, level stretch of dyke, which 
every now and then heaved itself up into a camel-backed 
bridge, under which toy boats could pass from the right-hand 
water-street to the left-hand water-street. We followed, but on 
the first bridge Nell stopped impulsively. 

“Do you know we’ve all been in this place before ? It’s 
Willow-pattern-land. Don't you recognize it ?” 

“Of course,” the Mariner assured her. “You and I used 
to play here together when we were children. You remember 
that blue boat of ours ? And see, there’s our house — the pink 
one, with the green-and-white-lozenge shutters, and the thick- 
et of hydrangeas reflected in the water. Isn’t it good to come 
back to our own ?” 

Thus he snatched her from me, just as my surprise was 
succeeding, and made a place for himself with her, in my toy 
fairyland. 

“It’s true ! One does feel like one of the little blue people 


172 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

that live in a willow-pattern plate,” said Phyllis, as Nell and 
Starr sauntered on ahead. “It’s perfectly Chinese here, but 
so cozy; I believe you had the place made a few minutes ago, 
to please us, and as soon as we turn our backs it will disappear. 
It can't be real.” 

“Those men think it’s real,” said I. There were several, 
rowing along the canals in brightly painted boats, with brass 
milk cans, and knife-grinding apparatus, calmly unaware that 
they or their surroundings were out of the common. Each 
house on its square island having its own swing-bridge of 
planks, the men on the water had to push each bridge out of 
the way as they reached it; but the trick was done with the 
nose of the boat, and cost no trouble. Most of the toy bridges 
swung back into place when the boats passed, but the one 
nearest us remained open, and as we looked, walking on slow- 
ly, two tiny children returning from school, clattered toward 
us in wooden sabots, along the narrow dyke. Opposite the dis- 
arranged bridge they stopped, looking wistfully across at a 
green-and-blue house, standing in a grove of pink-and-yellow 
roses, shaded with ruddy copper beeches, and delicate white 
trees like young girls trooping to their first communion. 

Evidently this was the children’s home, but they found 
themselves shut off from it; and standing hand-in-hand, with 
their book-bags tossed over their shoulders, they uttered a 
short, wailing cry. As if in answer to an accustomed signal, a 
pink-cheeked girl who, of course, had been cleaning some- 
thing, came to the rescue, mop in hand. She touched the bridge 
with her foot; the bridge swung into place; without a word 
the dolls crossed, and were swallowed up in a narrow, sky- 
blue corridor. 

We wandered on, turning our heads from one side to the 
other, I reveling in the delight of the others. Though Aals- 
meer is but a stone’s throw from Amsterdam, it seems as far 
out of the world as if, to get to it, you had jumped off the 


RUDOLPH BREDERODF/S POINT OF VIEW 173 
earth into some obscurely twinkling star, where people, things, 
and customs were completely different from those on our 
planet. 

If there had been only one of the queer island-houses to 
see, it would have been worth a journey; but each one we 
came to, in its double street of glass, seemed more quaint than 
that we left behind. Some were painted green or blue, with 
wdiite rosettes, like the sugar ornaments on children’s birthday 
cakes. Some were so curtained with roses, wistaria, or purple 
clematis, that it was difficult to spy out the color underneath. 
Some were half hidden behind tall hedges of double holly- 
hocks, like crisp bunches of pink and golden crepe; others had 
triumphal arches of crimson fuchsias; but best of all the is- 
land shows were the dwarf box-trees, cut in every imaginable 
shape. There were thrones, and chairs, and giant vases; harps 
and violins; and a menagerie of animals which seemed to have 
come under a spell and been turned into leafage in the act 
of jumping, flying, and hopping. There were lions, swans, 
dragons, giraffes, parrots, eagles, cats, together in a happy 
family of foliage; and when I told the Chaperon that the peo- 
ple of Aalsmeer were garden-artists, as well as market-gar- 
deners, she insisted on stopping. Nothing would satisfy her 
but the Mariner must cross the bridge, knock at the door of a 
little red house, and buy a box-tree baby elephant, which she 
thought would be enchanting in a pot, as a kind of figurehead 
on board “Waterspin.” 

Nor was I allowed to remain idle. When I had helped 
him bargain for the leafy beast, I had to go down on my knees, 
roll up my sleeves, and claw water-lilies out from the canal, 
which they fringed in luscious clusters. This I did while men 
and maids in painted boats heaped with rubies piled on emer- 
alds (which were strawberries in beds of their own leaves) 
laughed at me. Boat peddlers came and went, too, with stores 
of shining tin, or blue, brown, and green pottery that glittered 


174 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

in the afternoon sun. Some of them helped me, some jeered in 

Dutch at “these foreigners with their childish ways.” 

In the end I was luckier than Starr, for he had to march 
under the weight of his green elephant, half hidden behind it, 
as behind a screen, while my lilies were so popular with the 
ladies that not even as a favor would I have been allowed to 
carry one. All three, if left to themselves, would have lingered 
for hours, choosing which house they would live in, or watch- 
ing families of ducks, or counting strewn flowers floating down 
the blue water as stars float down the sky. 

“I believe, Nephew, that I must ask you to buy me a house 
in Aalsmeer to come and play dolls in,” announced Aunt 
Fay. “Don’t you suppose, Jonkheer, that one could be got 
cheap ? — not that that need be a consideration to dear 
Ronny !” 

“I’ll find out — later,” I assured her, answering a despair- 
ing look of Starr’s from between the green tusks of his ele- 
phant. 

“Oh, please, note,” urged the gentle voice which every one 
but Tibe obeys; “because, you know, I’m not strong, and 
when I set my heart on a thing, and suffer disappointment, it 
makes me ill. If I were ill I should have to go home, and 
those darling girls couldn’t finish the trip.” 

“You haven’t had time to set your heart upon a house 
here,” said Starr. “You only thought of it a minute ago.” 

“We Scotch have so much heart, dearest, that it goes out 
to things — and people — in less than a minute. I’m a victim 
to mine. It would be a pity ” 

“Oh, do go to the head fairy at once, Alb, and demand a 
cheap house for my aunt to play dolls in,” groaned Starr. “If 
he hasn’t got one, he must build it. ” 

“He could easily do that,” said I. “Every now and then a 
new island is formed in this water-world, and the nearest 
householder seizes it, claiming it as^is own, on much the 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 175 
same basis that Napoleon claimed the Netherlands. Then he 
digs it into an extra garden or strawberry bed. But he would 
sacrifice his vegetables if he saw a prospect of making money. 
It might amuse Lady MacNairne to do a little amateur mar- 
ket gardening, though they say slugs are unusually fat and 
juicy in Aalsmeer.” 

“Oh! Maybe I’d better wait and see a few more places 
before I decide, then,” exclaimed the lady. “Not that I’m 
afraid of slugs myself, only I’m sure they wouldn’t agree 
with Tibe. And besides, it would be dull for him in winter.” 

“Not at all,” said I, having discovered that the one possible 
way of detaching the lady from a pet scheme is by advising 
her to cling to it. “Everybody skates then, instead of going 
about in boats, and no one has really seen Aalsmeer who 
hasn’t seen it on a winter evening. Then, in front of each 
island, on a low square post, is set a lighted lantern. Imagine 
the effect of a double line of such lights all the way down the 
long, long canal, each calling up a ghost-light from under the 
blue ice.” 

The tyrant shivered. “It sounds lovely,” she said; “but 
I think I will wait. Come, girls, we’d better be getting back 
to the boat.” 

“Sweet are the uses of an Albatross,” I heard Starr murmur. 

We turned our backs on the water fairies’ domain, and 
went into the world again. In the long commonplace street 
of shops through which we had passed in coming, Aunt Fay 
stopped. She had torn a silk flounce on her petticoat, and 
would thank me to act as interpreter in buying a box of safety- 
pins. I made the demand, and could not see why the two 
girls and their chaperon had to stifle laughter when an earnest, 
flaxen-haired maiden began industriously to count the pins in 
the box. 

“She says she has to do that, because they are sold by the 
piece, ” I explained ; but they laughed a great deal more. 


176 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

It was a pity they could not see the meer which rings in 
their fairyland — a meer dotted with high -standing, prim 
little islands, which, though made by nature, not man, have 
much the same effect, on a larger scale, as the clipped box- 
trees on show in the gardens. But to have taken “Lorelei” that 
way would have made it too late for a visit to Zaandam; and I 
thought Zaandam, despite its miles of windmills and the boast- 
ed hut of Peter the Great, not worth a separate expedition. So 
I turned back to Halfweg, and from there slid into a side canal 
which bore us toward that immense waterway cut for great 
ships — the North Sea Canal. There was a smell of salt in the 
air, and a heavy perfume from slow-going peat-boats. Gulls 
wheeled over “Lorelei” so low that we could have reached up 
and caught their dangling coral feet. A passing cloud veiled 
the sun with gray tissue which streaked the water with purple 
shadow, and freckled it with rain. Passengers on Amsterdam- 
bound ships that loomed above us like leviathans, stared 
down at our little craft and the bluff-browed barge we towed. 
Here we were in the full stream of sea-going traffic and com- 
merce; and afar off a mass of towers showed where Amster- 
dam toiled and made merry. 

But we were not yet bound for Amsterdam. Twisting north- 
ward as the details of the city were sketched upon the sky, 
we turned into the canal which leads to Zaandam of the self- 
satisfied, painted houses. There was just time for a swift run 
down the river, and a call at one of that famous battalion of 
windmills whose whirling sails fill the air with a ceaseless 
whirr, like the flight of birds at sunset; then a walk to the 
hovel where Peter the Great lived and learned to be a ship- 
wright. But when they had seen it, the ladies would not allow 
it to be called by so mean a name. 

“What a shame they found out who he was so soon !” said 
Nell. “And he had to leave this dear little bandbox to go 
back to a mere every-day palace. I wouldn’t have been driven 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 177 
away by a curious crowd. I should just have marched through 
with my nose in the air. ” 

“His nose wasn’t of that kind,” said I. “I suppose he’s 
the earliest, martyr to notoriety on record. But perhaps he 
had learned all he wanted to know; and I’m not sure he was 
sorry to go back to his palace, which, judging by all accounts, 
wasn’t a grand one in those days. You’ll see finer houses even 
in Amsterdam.” 

And an hour later she was seeing them. 


XV 


A MSTERDAM was in full glory that evening, in the 
strange radiance that shines for her, as for Venice, 

, when red wine of sunset and purple wine of. night 
mingle together in the gold cup of the west. 

At such a time she is a second Venice, not because she is 
built upon piles and stands upon many islands linked by 
intricate bridges, but because of her glow and dazzle, her 
myriad lights breaking suddenly through falling dusk, to 
splash the rose and violet of the clouds with gilded flecks, and 
drop silver into glimmering canals, as if there were some 
festive illumination; because of her huge, colorful buildings, 
and her old, old houses bowing and bending backward and 
forward to whisper into each other’s windows across the dark- 
ness of narrow streets and burning lines of water. 

The fierce traffic of the day was over, but the dam roared 
and rumbled, in vast confusion, with its enormous structures 
black against the moldering ashes of sunset. 

“A cathedral without a tower; a palace without a king; a 
bishop’s house without a bishop; a girl without a lover,” is the 
saying that Amsterdammers have about the dam; and I re- 
peated it as we drove through, while my friends searched the 
verification of the saw. All was plain enough, except the “girl 
without a lover”; but when they learned that she was a stone 
girl on a pedestal too constricted for two figures they pro- 
nounced her part of the distich far-fetched. 

Undaunted by all they had done that day, they would go 
out again after dinner, when Amsterdam was blue and silver 
and shining steel in the quiet streets, with a flare of yellow 

178 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 179 
light in the lively ones, where people crowded the roadways, 
listening to the crash of huge hand-organs, or shopping until 
ten o’clock. 

We supped at the biggest cafe in Europe; and then for 
contrast, since we were in a city of contrasts, I took them to 
the quaintest inn of Amsterdam — a queer little pointed- 
roofed house hiding the painted “Wilderman” over his low- 
roofed door, behind a big archway, in the midst of all that is 
most modern, but with an interior of a rich gold-brown gloom, 
lit by glints of brass and gleams of pewter which would have 
delighted Rembrandt. 

Next day it was to his house, in the strange, teeming 
Jewish quarter that we went first of all; but Nell and 
Phyllis were heartsick to find the rooms, once rich in treas- 
ures, piled untidily with “curiosities” of no great beauty or 
value. 

Then, by way of a change after the Old Town, and the 
harbor with its queer houses, like drunken men trying to prop 
each other up, I chose the Heerengracht, all the city has of the 
richest and most exclusive. But the tall mansions, with their 
air of reserve and their selfishly hidden gardens, struck the eye 
coldly; and not even my tales of tapestry, lace, old silver, and, 
above all, Persian carpets, to be seen behind the veiled win- 
dows, could arouse the ladies’ curiosity. It was well enough 
to have built Amsterdam in concentric crescents, with the 
Heerengracht in the center, and to say arbitrarily that the 
further you went outwards, the further you descended in the 
social scale. That distinction might do for the townspeople; 
as for them, they would rather live in a black and brown house 
in the Keizergracht, with a crane and pulley in one of the 
gables, and white frames on the windows, than in this dull 
street of wealth and fashion. 

“Even half a house, jvith a whole door of my own, like 
most middle-class Dutch houses, would be nicer,” said Nell. 


180 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Yes, I could be happy in ‘a boven huis,’ with my little stair- 
way and hall quite to myself. ” 

But when I had shown her my favorite bit of Amsterdam, 
she became unfaithful to the Keizergracht, and its picturesque 
fellows. 

To reach this bit, we turned from the roar of a noisy street, 
and were at once in the calm of a monastic cloister. 

It was like opening a door in the twentieth century, and 
falling down a step into the seventeenth, to find Time lying 
enchanted in a spell of magic sleep. 

What we saw was a spacious quadrangle with an old- 
fashioned, flowery garden in the midst, and ranged round it 
pretty little houses, each one a gem of individuality. There 
was a church, too, a charming, forgotten-looking church; and 
in the quadrangle nothing stirred but gleams of light on 
polished windows and birds which hopped about on the pave- 
ment as if it had been made for them. 

“I believe they’re the inhabitants of the place, who’ve 
hurriedly changed into birds just while we are here, but will 
change back into little, trim old ladies and old gentlemen,” 
whispered Nell; for it seemed sacrilege to break the silence. 

With that, a house door opened, and just such an old lady 
as she described came out. 

“Oh, she didn’t know we were here. She won’t have time 
to get into her birdhood now,” chuckled Nell, “so she’s making 
the best of it. But see, she’s turned to warn her husband.” 

“She hasn’t any husband,” said I. 

“How can you tell ?” asked the girl. 

“If she had, she couldn’t live here, ” I explained, “because this 
is the Begynenhof , half almshouse, half nunnery, which has been 
kept up since our great year, 1574. But oddly enough the chapel 
of the sisterhood who established it, has been turned into an 
English church. Queer, in the little Catholic village hidden 
away from the great city ; but so it is. And isn’t it a serene spot ?” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 181 

“iVlmost nicer than Aalsmeer,” murmured the Chaperon. 
“I wonder if ” 

But Starr was at the door of the exit before she could 
finish wondering. 

The palace, more suitable for a magnificent town hall than 
a regal dwelling, was the next violent contrast in my bag of 
colors; but, royal though it was, there was nothing in it they 
cared for much except the throne-room, which they had to 
admit was not to be surpassed. There were a few mantel- 
pieces too, which the Chaperon thought she would accept from 
the Queen as presents; but as for the carpets, they were no less 
than tragic, and it would be better to go about opening bridges, 
or laying dull cornerstones, then stay at home and look at them. 

My way of showing Amsterdam was to work slowly up to a 
grand crescendo effect; and the crescendo was the Ryks 
Museum. We had two days of Amsterdam (the second was 
mostly spent at the diamond cutters’) before I suggested the 
museum. 

Aunt Fay said, when I did, that she hated such places. 
They gave her a headache, a heartache, and a bad cold. But 
she did not hate the Ryks Museum, and delighted the Mariner 
by picking out the best Rembrandts. After our first day at the 
museum (which we gave to the pictures) she could have had 
anything she asked from her dearest Ronny. 

Then there were the Dutch rooms, and the rooms where 
the wax people live. I did not speak of the wax people until 
the ladies were tired, therefore they were cold to the idea of 
wax figures, even when they heard that the Queen had been 
five or six times to see them. 

“Perhaps she never saw Madame Tussaud’s,” remarked 
Miss Rivers, in a superior, British way; but the magic word 
was spoken when I said that the wax people wore every variety 
of costume to be found in Holland, and I was ordered to 
conduct the party to them at once. 


182 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Instantly they felt the alarming fascination of the wax 
faces, whose hard eyes say, “At night we live, and walk about 
as you are doing now”: and at the closing hour Aunt Fay and 
the two girls had to be forcibly torn away. 

“Is it possible that some day we shall see live people 
dressed as those wax people are ?” she exclaimed. 

“You will see them by the hundred,” I answered. 

She paused a moment. “Miss Van Buren wants to know 
if one can buy any special costume to which one takes a fancy.” 

“Yes, if one doesn’t mind what one pays,” I answered; 
“but I was nettled that the girl could not have asked so simple 
a question herself. This is not the first time she has employed 
a go-between, to find out something which I alone know, 
and doubtless there will be more occasions, if I let things go 
on as they are going now. But I don’t mean to let them go on. 
What I shall do, I haven’t made up my mind; yet some step 
must be taken, if I am to reap anything from this trip except a 
harvest of snubbings. 

It was only a little thing that she should question me 
through her chaperon, regarding the costumes; but it was one 
more straw in a rapidly growing bundle. And on the way 
back to the hotel from the museum she pretended not to hear 
when I spoke. She discussed with Starr, and not with me, 
the splendors and the crudities of Amsterdam, and asked if 
he didn’t detect here and there a likeness to some old bit of 
New York — “New Amsterdam.” Of course he agreed; and 
they talked of the “Dutchness” of Poughkeepsie and Albany, 
and Hudson, and many other places which I never heard of. 
No wonder that there was triumph in the glance he threw me. 
Alb (he was thinking, no doubt) was not getting much fun for 
his money. And it was true. Nevertheless, Alb was not dis- 
couraged. He was making up his mind that the time for quiet 
patience was over, as the skipper of “Lorelei” had engaged for 
something better. 


XVI 


B Y Jove, here’s a lark!” exclaimed Starr, at the 
breakfast table, looking up from the Paris Herald . 

It was at the Amstel Hotel, on our fourth 
morning, and he and I were taking coffee together, 
as an Ancient Mariner and his Albatross should. The ladies had 
not yet appeared, for they were breakfasting in their rooms. 
“What’s up ?” I asked. 

“It’s under the latest news of your Queen’s doings,” said 
he, and began to read aloud: “ ‘Jonkheer Brederode, who is 
equally popular in English and Dutch society and sporting 
circles, has taken for the season a large motor-boat, in which 
he is touring the waterways of Holland, with a party of invited 
friends, among whom is Lady MacNairne. It was her portrait, 
as everybody knows, painted by the clever American artist, 
Mr. R. L. Starr, which was so much admired at the Paris 
Salon this spring. ’ Funny, how they strung that story together, 
isn’t it ? But it’s a bore — er — in the circumstances, their 
having got hold of my aunt’s name.” 

“People who weave tangled webs mustn’t be surprised if 
they get caught in them sometimes,” said I. 

“I wonder how Miss Van Buren will like this ? She’s sure 
to see it,” Starr went on, reflectively. 

How she liked it mattered more to me than to anybody 
else, because if she disliked it, I was the person upon whom 
her vexation would be visited. But there was a still more 
important point which apparently hadn’t come under the 
Mariner’s consideration. How would Lady MacNairne’s hus- 
band like it ? 


183 


184 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Evidently Starr doesn’t know that there has been an upset 
of some sort between Sir Alec and the charming Fleda; and 
as Fleda is his aunt, bu has not confided in her nephew (while 
she has in me) no matter what trouble the newspaper para- 
graph may cause for the entire party, it would be a breach of 
confidence for me to enlighten him. 

“By Jove,” I said to myself, “what will MacNaime do if 
he sees in the paper that his wife, who has run away from home 
without telling him where she’s staying, is the principal guest 
on board a boat of mine ? I ought to warn Starr that there 
may be a crash, but I can’t.” 

The only thing I could do was to pump him, in the hope 
that he knew more of his aunt’s affairs than I supposed. 

“My stock’s pretty far down in the market with Miss Van 
Buren already,” said I. “It can’t go lower. I wonder how 
these asses think of such nonsense ? But I suppose it came of 
registering ‘Lorelei’ in my name, which I had to do, to use the 
flag of the Sailing and Rowing Club of Rotterdam. Somebody 
heard of the boat’s being registered by Rudolph Brederode, 
and voila the consequences. But where is Lady MacNairne ?” 

“Heavens, don’t yell at the top of your voice,” groaned 
Starr, in a dreadful whisper. “There may be some one at the 
next table who can speak English. I’ve had an awful lesson, 
as nobody knows better than you, to behave in a restaurant as 
if I were at church. The real Lady McN., who is not up-stairs 
at the present moment breakfasting with Tibe, may be in 
Kamschatka for all I know, though I think it probable she’s 
not. All I do know is that she’s never answered two frantic 
telegrams of mine. She’s not at home. She may be anywhere 
else — except in Holland, where she’s wanted.” 

“It would be awkward if she should turn up now,” I re- 
marked. 

“ Was wanted, I ought to have said. But she’s such a good 
pal, I should fix things up with her somehow.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 185 

“I doubt if you would with her husband,” I thought, 
though aloud I said nothing. I was sure now that he was in 
ignorance of the situation, blissful ignorance, since he could 
not guess what developments it might lead to for him, and for 
the Chaperon whom he had provided at such cost. 

“If anything happens, I shall have to help him through it 
somehow,” I decided, “as it’s more than half my fault, register- 
ing ‘ Lorelei ’ in my name. Besides, I can’t let the party be 
broken up, until I’ve had a fair chance to raise Brederode 
stock in the market.” 

To know that at any moment Sir Alec MacNairne might 
pounce upon us, denounce the Chaperon as a fraud, disgust 
the girls with Starr, and put a sudden end to the adventure as 
far as the two men in it were concerned, was not conducive to 
appetite. I forgot whether I had just begun my breakfast, or 
just finished it, but in either case it interested me no more 
than eggs and toast would have interested Damocles at the 
moment of discovering the sword. 

“The principal thing is not to let the girls see the Herald ,” 
said Starr. 

I wished it were the principal thing; still, I said nothing, 
and getting up, we went into the hall. 

“Miss Van Buren would think it cool of you, perhaps, if 
she knew you’d registered her boat in your name,” said 
Starr, taking up the subject again. “She wouldn’t under- 
stand ” 

II What would Miss Van Buren think cool?” asked Miss 
Van Buren’s voice behind us, and the Mariner started as if we 
were conspirators. 

“Oh, nothing particular,” he answered limply. 

“Please tell me.” 

“I’ll tell you,” I said, with a sudden determination that she 
should know the worst, and do her worst, and be conquered 
by something stronger than her prejudice. The tug-of-war 


186 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

was coming between us now, that tug-of-war I had been ex- 
pecting and almost desiring. 

“I registered your boat in my name,” I said calmly, “and 
Starr thinks you wouldn’t understand. ” 

She threw up her head, flushing. “I don't understand. ” 

“It gives us the right to use the flag of my club. ” 

“We could have got on without it. ” 

“Often with grave inconvenience.” 

“I would have risked that. ” 

“Forgive me, but amateurs are always ready to take risks.” 
(At this moment I became aware that Starr had slipped 
away.) 

“Isn’t it rather late,” she flashed at me, “to ask my for- 
giveness for — anything ?” 

“It was a mere civility,” I answered with equal insolence. 
“I’ve done nothing for which I’ve felt the need of your forgive- 
ness, Miss Van Buren; but if you think I have, pray tell me 
once for all what it was, that I may defend myself. ” 

“You don’t feel,” she echoed, “that you've done anything 
for which you need my forgiveness? Oh, then you’re more 
hardened than I thought. I hoped that by this time you were 
repenting. ” 

“Repenting of what ?” 

“Of everything. Of — putting yourself in your present posi- 
tion, among other things.” 

“You mean in the position of your skipper ? I may say, 
that if I haven’t repented, it isn’t your fault. But, really, I’ve 
been so busy trying to make myself useful to the party in more 
ways than one, that I’ve had no time for repentance. ” 

“Oh, you have made yourself useful,” she had the grace to 
admit. “If — it hadn’t been for the beginning , I — I should 
have been grateful. You know things which none of the rest of 
us know. You’ve shown us sights which without you we should 
never have seen or heard of. But as it is, how can I, why 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 187 
should I, be grateful ? It’s only for the sake of the others, and 
their pleasure, that I ” 

“So you said before,” I broke in. “But now I refuse to 
accept toleration from you — we won’t say consideration, for 
that’s too warm a word — for the sake of others. The boat is 
yours. I am your skipper. If, after serving you as well as I 
could for a week, you wish me to go, I will go. ” 

She stood and stared at me from under lashes meant only 
for sweet looks. 

“You will go ?” 

“Certainly. This moment. I only wait your word.” I heard 
myself saying it; and in a way I was sincere, though I was 
the same man who, only a few minutes since, had vowed 
to do anything rather than let the trip end. Of course I would 
have to go now, if she told me to go. But I knew that I should 
not go. As skipper, I was her servant, if she chose to give me 
the name; but as a man I felt myself her master. 

“I — I — ” she faltered, and I saw her throat flutter. “You’re 
putting me in a horrid position. We — I thought we’d settled 
this matter, things being as they are.” 

“Not at all, ” said I. “Nothing was settled. ” 

“You’re Mr. Starr’s friend, and I can’t send you away. ” 

“You can, easily,” I replied. “And since that appears to 
be your only reason for not doing so. I’ll not wait for your 
orders to go. Good-by, Miss Van Buren, I’ll do my best to 
get you another skipper, a professional this time. ” 

I moved a step away, and my blood was beating fast. 
Everything depended on the next instant. 

“Stop ! Please stop,” she said. 

I stopped, and looked at her coldly. 

For a moment we stood regarding each other in silence, 
for it seemed that, having detained me, she could think of 
nothing more to say. But suddenly she broke out, with a 
fierce little stamp of the foot. 


188 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 
“Oh! Sometimes I can understand why it was that Philip 
liked to torture the Dutch. ” 

It was all I could do not to burst out laughing. But it would 
have spoiled everything for me if I had laughed. 

“You have tortured the Dutch,” said I. “But now it’s 
finished. The Dutch have tired of the torture. ” 

“Oh, you’re tired ? Then you had better go, I suppose. 
Why are you waiting ?” 

“You stopped me for something. What was it ?” 

“I — hardly know. It was only — I was going to propose ” 

“You were going to propose ?” 

“That — you stayed a little longer. You were to take us — 
them, I mean — on an excursion to-day in your motor-car. 
They’re getting ready now. They’ll be - — so disappointed. ” 
“I’ll lend you — them — my car and my chauffeur.” 

“No, it would be horrid without y — It would be too un- 
gracious. I — they — couldn’t accept.” 

“I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t you think maybe you’d better stay a little longer ?” 
“No, Miss Van Buren, I go now, or I — go with you to the 
end.” I wonder if she guessed just what I meant by those 
words ? “I’ll not stop, after what’s passed between us, for 
a day longer, except on two conditions. ” 

“Conditions ? You make conditions with me ?” 

“Certainly, I have the right.” 

“You are extraordinary. ” 

“I am a Dutchman. ” 

“Oh, here comes Lady MacNairne — in her motor-coat 
and hood. She bought them yesterday — because they’re 
Tibe-color. What excuse can I make ? Oh, what are your 
conditions?” 

“First, that you tell me you want me to stay. ” 

“I do — on their account. ” 

“That’s not the way.” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 189 

“Well, then, I ask you to stay. I hope your next condition 
isn’t as hard.” 

“You must be the judge. It is, that you’ll be civil to me, 
and friendly — at least in appearance. I have done, and will 
do my best for you and ‘Lorelei.’ In return, I’ll have no more 
snubs.” 

“But if they’ve been deserved ? No ! I won’t be brow- 
beaten.” 

“Nor will I. Good-by, again, Miss Van Buren.” 

“Here comes Phil now, in her motoring things. Oh dear! 
Have it as you like. I will — be nice to you. ” 

She smiled in spite of herself, or else to encourage me with 
a sample of future treatment; and giving way to impulse at 
last, I held out my hand. 

“Shake hands on the bargain, then, and it’s signed and 
sealed,” I said. 

She laid her fingers delicately in mine, and dared not look 
resentful when I gently pressed them. 

For all I cared, she might see the Paris Herald now. For 
all I cared, the sky might fall. 


XVII 


N EVER was man in better mood for the rush and 
thrill of the motor than I, after the conquering of 
Miss Van Buren. It was but a shadow victory, a 
tempest in a tea-pot, yet it was so good an augury 
of a further triumph for which I hoped in future, that the joy 
of it went fizzily to my head, and I could have shouted, if I 
had been alone in some desert place with nobody by to know 
that it was a Dutchman who made a fool of himself. 

It was the first time I had had the car out in Amsterdam; 
for the city, with its network of electric trams and tremendous 
traffic, is far from idea for motoring, and I wanted to keep the 
nerves of my people cool for sight-seeing. Therefore the auto- 
mobile had been eating her head off in a garage, while we 
pottered about in cabs, driven by preposterously respectable- 
looking old gentlemen, bearded as to their chins, and white as 
to the seams of their coats. 

To take “ Lorelei ,r to all the places I meant to see to-day 
would have occupied half a week, though none were at a great 
distance from Amsterdam but the waterways there do not in 
all places connect conveniently for a boat of “Lorelei’s” size, 
though we might have left “Waterspin” behind. So I proposed 
the car, and everybody caught at the idea. 

There was not one of the party who by this time had not 
studied guide-books enough to know something of Muiden, 
Laren, Baarn, Hilversum, and Amersfoort; but they might 
have searched Baedeker and all his rivals from end to end with- 
out finding even the name of Spaakenberg; and little quaint, 
hidden Spaakenberg was to be the clou of our expedition . 

190 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 191 

It was ten o’clock when I got them all — including Tibe — 
into the car; indeed, it always seems to be exactly ten o’clock 
when we start on any excursion, even when it has been decided 
over night that we should set off promptly at nine. But Starr, 
who pretends to knowledge of women’s ways, says we are 
lucky to get away anywhere before eleven, seeing that at the 
last moment one of the ladies remembers that she must write 
and post an important letter, which will take only five minutes; 
or she finds she has forgotten her purse in a drawer at the 
hotel, and must go back; or she thinks she will be too cool 
or too hot, and must make some change in her costume; or if 
nothing of this sort happens, Tibe is lost sight of for a second, 
and disappears in pursuit of new friendships, canine or hu- 
man. He has then not only to be retrieved, which is usually an 
affair of twenty minutes, but has to be caressed for an extra 
five by his mistress, who never fails to abandon hope of seeing 
him again the moment he is out of sight. 

To test the quality of Miss Van Buren’s resolutions, I asked 
her to take the seat beside the driver, expecting some excuse; 
but she came like a lamb ; and the taste of conquest was sweet 
in my mouth. 

In Haarlem all had proved such good motorists that, de- 
spite the ferocity of Amsterdam trams, I was scarcely prepared 
for the emotions which began to seethe in the tonneau the 
moment the car was started and the chauffeur had sprung to 
his place at my feet. According to my idea, there’s no courage 
in reckless driving, but selfishness and other less agreeable 
qualities; still, we did not exactly dawdle as we left the Amstel, 
to swing out into the tide of city life. 

“Heavens, he’s going to kill us!” I heard the Chaperon 
groan. “Ronald, tell him to stop.” 

Miss Rivers was also giving vent to despairing murmurs. 
Tibe was “wuffing” full-noted threats at each tram which 
loomed toward us, and Starr was attempting to advise me over 


192 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

my shoulder that the ladies would wish to be driven less furi- 
ously. 

To my joy, Nell looked back and laughed. “Why, we’re 
not going more than seven miles an hour, ” said she. 

“Then, for goodness’ sake, let’s go one,” implored her 
chaperon. “I never dreamed of anything so awful.” 

I slackened pace. “Are you an old motorist ?” I inquired 
of my companion, as if I were used to asking her friendly, 
commonplace questions. 

“I never was in a car until the other day with my cousin,” 
said she, in the same carefully unconscious tone.' “And I’m 
afraid in my feet and hands now; but the rest of me is enjoy- 
ing it awfully. Yes, that’s the word, I think, for it is rather 
awful. I shouldn’t have dreamed that trams could look so 
big, or bridges so narrow, except in nightmares. And — and 
you can’t make your horn heard much , can you, over the noise 
on the stones ? Oh, there was a close shave with that wagon, 
wasn’t it ? I felt bristling like a fretful porcupine — oh, but a 
stark, staring mad, blithering, driveling porcupine !” 

It was delicious to have her talk to me, and to feel that 
because she trusted my skill, she was not really afraid, but 
only excited enough to forget her stiffness. 

“Perhaps Amsterdam wouldn’t be a pleasant place to 
learn ‘chauffeuring ’ in,” I said; “but it’s all right when you 
have learned.” 

“It’s a good thing,” she went on, “that motoring wasn’t 
invented by some grand seignor*in the Middle Ages, when the 
rich thought no more of the poor than we do of flies, or they’d 
have run over every one who didn’t get out of their way on the 
instant. They’d have had a sort of cow-catcher fitted on to 
their cars, to keep themselves from coming to harm, and they’d 
have dashed people aside, anyhow In these days, no matter 
how hard your heart may be, you have to sacrifice your in- 
clinations more of less to decency. I dare say the Car of Jug- 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 193 
gernaut was a motor. Oh, what a huge town ! Shall we ever 
get out of Pandemonium into the country 

We did get out at last, and suddenly, for in Hollow Land 
the line between town and country is abrupt, with no fading of 
city into suburb and meadow. One moment we were in the 
bustle of Amsterdam; the next, we were running along a 
klinker road, straight as a ruler, beside a quiet canal. Such 
horses as we met, being accustomed to the traffic of Amster- 
dam, had no fear of the motor, which was well; for on so nar- 
row a road, with the canal on one side, and a deep drop into 
meadows on the other, an adventure would be disagreeable. 
But it was not all straight sailing ahead. Outside the traffic, 
I put on speed to make up for lost time, and the car quickly 
ate up the distance between Amsterdam and Muiden. 

My passengers broke into admiration of the medieval 
fortress with its paraphernalia of moats, bastions, and draw- 
bridges, which give an air of historic romance to the country 
round ; but their emotion would have been of a different kind 
had they guessed the risk we must take in running through the 
winding fortifications. It was not so great a risk that it was 
foolish to take it, and thirty or forty cars must do the same 
thing every day; but the fact was, that we had to run through 
these tunnels on tram-lines, with no room to turn out in case 
of meeting a steam monster from Hilversum. I had chosen my 
time, knowing the hours for trams; still, had there been a de- 
lay, there was a chance of a crash, for our horn could not be 
heard by the tram driver, nor could he see us in time to put 
on his brakes and prevent a collision. 

With the girl I love beside me, and three other passengers, 
not to mention the chauffeur, it was with a tenseness of the 
nerves that I drove through the labyrinth, and I was glad to 
clear Muiden. Next came Naarden — that tragic Naarden 
whose capture and sack by the Spaniards encouraged Alva to 
attack Haarlem; and then, without one of the party having 


194 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

dreamed of danger, we swung out on the road to Laren, a 
road set in pineland and heather, which would have reminded 
the real Lady MacNairne of her Scottish home. There was 
actually something like a hill here and there, which the stran- 
gers were astonished to find in Holland, and would hardly be- 
lieve when I said that, on reaching Gelderland, I would be 
able to show them a Dutch mountain two hundred feet high, 
among a colony of smaller eminences to which half the Nether- 
lands rush in summer. 

Meanwhile they were satisfied with what they saw; and it 
is a pretty enough road, this way between Amsterdam and 
Laren. At first we had had the canal, with its sleepy barges, 
peopled with large families, and towed by children harnessed 
in tandem at the end of long ropes; its little shady, red-and- 
green wayside houses, with “Melk Salon” printed attractively 
over their doors. We had had avenues of trees, knotted here 
and there into groves; we had passed pretty farmhouses with 
bright milk-cans and pans hanging on the red walls, like 
placks in a drawing-room ; we had seen gardens flooded with 
roses, and long stretches of water carpeted with lilies white and 
yellow; then we had come to pine forests and heather, and 
always we had had the good klinker which, though not as 
velvety for motoring as asphalt, is free from dust even in dry 
weather. We had run almost continuously on our fourth speed ; 
and even in Laren I came down to the second only long 
enough to let them all see the beauty of the Mauve country. 

Starr knows Anton Mauve’s pictures, and his history; but 
the ladies had seen only a few delicious landscapes in the Ryks 
Museum. Still, they liked to hear that at Laren Corot’s great 
disciple had found inspiration. Nowhere in the Netherlands 
are there such beautiful barns, each one of which is a back- 
ground for a Nativity picture; and it was Laren peasants, 
Laren cows, and the sunlit and cloud-shadowed meadows of 
Laren which kept Mauve’s brush busy for years. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 195 

After the charm of Haarlem’s suburbs, Hilversum, where 
merchants of Amsterdam play at being in the country, was 
disappointing; but having lunched in open air, and spun on 
toward Amersfoort, we ran into a district which holds some 
delightful houses, set among plane trees, varied with flowering 
acacias and plantations of oak. Everywhere our eyes followed 
long avenues cut in the forest, avenues stretching out like the 
rays of a star, and full of a tremulous green light, shot with 
gold. 

In the midst of this forest we came upon Soestdyk, where 
the Queen-Mother lives, that pleasant palace with its romance 
of a mysterious, secret room; then by-and-by we ran into 
Amersfoort, ringed by its park, and Nell was so entranced 
with the Gothic church tower, that she rejoiced to hear it was 
the finest in the northern Netherlands. 

I had chosen market-day in Amersfoort for our drive, and 
as we sailed into the spacious square of the town, my passen- 
gers saw in one moment more Dutch costumes than in all their 
previous days in Hollow Land. 

It was too late for the best of the picture ; still, the market- 
place glittered with gold and silver helmets, and delicate 
spiral head-ornaments. Ear-rings flashed in the sun, and mas- 
sive gold brooches and buckles. There was a moving rainbow 
of color and a clatter of sabots, as the market women packed 
up their wares ; but there was no time to linger, if we were to 
reach Spaakenberg before the shadows grew long. We sped 
on, until the next toll-gate (we had come to so many that Nell 
said our progress was made by tolling, rather than tooling 
along the roads) where a nice apple-cheeked old lady shook 
her white cap at the motor, while accepting my pennies. It 
was her opinion, though she was not sure, that the road — oh, 
a very bad road ! — to Spaakenberg, was now forbidden to 
automobiles. 

To tell the truth, I had never motored to Spaakenberg, but 


196 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I had bicycled, and thought there ought to be room on the 
narrow road for two vehicles, even if one were a motor and 
the other a hay-cart. 

I was not surprised that the old lady had no certainty with 
which to back up her opinion. It was more surprising that 
she should know of the existence of Spaakenberg, of which 
many Dutch bicyclists who pride themselves on their knowl- 
edge, have never heard. 

Naturally we determined to persevere, more than ever 
eager for a sight of the strange fishing-village, and a glimpse 
of the Zuider Zee. 

“But what shall we do if we find the road forbidden, and 
we’re too far off to walk ?” Nell asked. “It would be dreadful 
to turn back. ” 

“We shan’t turn back,” said I. “We’ll hire a wagon and 
go on, or — we’ll pass the sign which forbids us to proceed, 
too quickly to see it. Such things happen; and the road’s too 
narrow to turn or even to reverse. ” 

“I am glad you’re a Dutchman,” said she. 

“Why ? Because I know the ropes ?” 

“No. Because you’d die rather than give up anything 
you’ve set out to do.” 

It was now as if the apple-cheeked old prophetess had be- 
witched the country. The monarchs of the forest fled away 
and left us in the open, with a narrow strip of road between a 
canal loaded with water-lilies and low-lying meadows of yel- 
low grain. 

The landscape was charming, and the air balmy with sum- 
mer; but with the first horse we met all peace was over. 

Here were no longer the blase beasts of a sophisticated 
world. Animals of this region had never seen a town larger 
than Amersfoort. A motor-car was to them as horrifying an 
object as a lion escaping from his cage at a circus. 

Horses reared, hay-carts swayed, peasants shrieked maledic- 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 197 
tions or shook fists; but always, crawling at snail’s pace, we 
managed to scrape past without accident. Sometimes we 
frightened cows; and a couple of great yellow dogs, drawing 
a cart which contained two peasant girls in costume, swore 
canine oaths against the car. 

“Oh, mercy, we’ve just passed a sign in Dutch, ‘Motors 
forbidden ’ ! ” cried Nell. 

“Well, we’ve passed it,” said I. “Perhaps it meant that 
side road ; it’s narrower than ours. Let’s think it did. ” 

So we gave it the benefit of the doubt and fled on, until in 
less than an hour we flashed into a fishing- village. They all 
cried, “Spaakenberg and the Zuider Zee!” But as it was not 
Spaakenberg, I gave them only a flashing glimpse of masts and 
dark blue water. 

Half a mile’s drive along a canal, and we came to our 
destination. And of Spaakenberg the first thing we saw was a 
forest of masts, with nets like sails, brown, yet transparent as 
spider-webs. Fifty sturdy fishing-boats were grouped together 
in a basin of quiet water within sight of the Zuider Zee, which 
calls to men on every clear night, “the fish are waiting.” 

I stopped; and as we counted the boats, the whole able- 
bodied population of Spaakenberg issued from small, peak- 
roofed houses to see what monster made so odd a noise. By 
twenties and by thirties they came, wonderful figures, and the 
air rang with the music of sabots on klinker. 

There were young women carrying tiny round babies; there 
were old women who had all they could do to carry them- 
selves; there were little girls gravely knitting their brothers’ 
stockings; and toddling creatures so infinitesimal that one 
could not guess whether they would grow up male or female. 
There were men, too, but not many young ones; and there 
were plenty of chubby-faced boys. 

As for the women a*nd girls, they wore Heaven knows how 
many petticoats — seven or eight at the minimum — and 


198 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

their figures went out at the places where they should have 
gone in, and went in at the places where they should have 
gone out. They were like the old-fashioned ladies with pam 
niers on each side; and those who could not afford enough 
petticoats had padded out their own and their children’s hips 
to supply the right effect. 

Some had black hoods with furry rolls round their rose-and- 
snow faces; some heightened the brilliancy of their complexion 
by close-fitting caps of white lace, according to their religion 
— whether they were of the Catholic or Protestant faith; and 
the babies, in black hoods, neck-handkerchiefs, and balloon- 
like black skirts reaching to their feet, were the quaintest fig- 
ures of all. The men and boys, in their indigo blouses, were not 
living pictures like their female relatives, save when, with 
bright blue yokes over their shoulders (from which swung 
green, scarlet-lined pails, foaming with yellow cream), they 
returned from milking blue-coated, black and white cows. 

Unspoiled by the influx of strangers, the simple people 
thronged round us, not for what they might get, but for what 
they could see. We were quainter to them than they to us, and 
Tibe was as rare as a dragon. His mistress was of opinion 
that they believed the noise of the motor (now stilled) to have 
issued from his black velvet muzzle; and when we all, includ- 
ing the tragic-faced, happy-hearted bulldog, got out to wander 
past the rows of tiny houses in the village, they swarmed round 
him, buzzed round him, whirled round him, to his confusion. 

Escape seemed hopeless, when Nell and Phyllis had an 
inspiration. They rushed in at the door of a miniature shop, 
with a few picture postcards and sweets in glass jars displayed 
in a dark window. Three minutes later they fought their way 
out through the crowd of strange dolls “come alive,” and, 
like a farmer sowing seed, strewed pink and white lozenges 
over the heads of girls and boys. 

Instantly the “clang of the wooden shoon” ceased. Down 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 199 
squatted the children with the suddenness of collapsed um- 
brellas. There was a scramble, and we seized the opportunity 
for flight. We had seen the Zuider Zee; we had seen the cows 
in blue coats; we had seen Spaakenberg; and Spaakenberg 
had seen us. 


XVIII 


R ETURNING by way of wooded Baarn, we spun 
back to Amsterdam when violet shadows lengthened 
over golden meadows, and gauzy mist-clouds floated 
above the canal, burnished to silver by the sunset. 
It was too late to do anything but dine and plan for to- 
morrow, which I had mapped out in my mind, subject to 
approval. But I let them all talk, as I often do, without saying 
anything until they turn to me with a question. 

“There’s an island which people say is wonderful, and you 
mustn’t miss it,” remarked the Chaperon. “But I’ve forgotten 
the name.” 

“Why is it wonderful ?” asked Miss Rivers. 

“I can’t remember. But there was something different 
about it from what you can see anywhere else.” 

“Dear me, how awkward. How are you to find it ?” sighed 
Phyllis. 

“Ask Alb to rapidly mention all islands in Holland, and 
perhaps it will come back to you,” suggested the Mariner. 
“Begin with A, Alb.” 

“Not worth while wasting the letters of the alphabet, ” said 
I. “Lady MacNairne (the name invariably sticks in my 
throat) means Marken.” 

“That's it!” exclaimed the Chaperon. “How could you 
guess ?” 

“There’s only one island that people talk about like that,” 
I replied. “It’s the great show place; and it’s like going to 
the theater. The curtain rings up when the audience arrives, 
and rings down when it departs. You’ll see tc -morrow.” 

200 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 201 

“To-morrow ?” 

“My idea was to take you there to-morrow, unless you 
prefer another place.” 

I looked at the mistress of the boat, and no hardness came 
into her eyes. The contrast between her manner yesterday 
and her manner since this morning was so marked that, in- 
stead of being wholly pleased, I was half alarmed. It seemed 
too good to be true that her feelings should have changed, and 
that the sun should continue to shine. 

“Why, certainly, let’s go to Marken,” she said. “I was 
thinking of Broek-in-Waterland, as I read it was near, and the 
sweetest place in Holland; however, we can go by-and-by, 
if ” 

“But my plan includes Broek-in-Waterland, gives you a 
glimpse of Monnikendam, takes you to Marken, and winds up 
at Volendam, beloved of artists,” said I. “I don’t believe we’ll 
find it easy to tear Starr from Volendam.” 

So it was settled, and every one agreed to be ready at ten 
o’clock next morning. But ten o’clock came, and no Nell, no 
Phyllis, no Chaperon. 

My car was at the door, as I intended to save time by motor- 
ing to the Club harbor, where the yacht was lying; and when 
Starr and I had waited in the hall for some minutes, Aunt 
Fay appeared. 

“Haven’t the girls come in yet with Tibe ?” she asked. 
There was a note of anxiety in her voice, though, owing to the 
fact that the blue spectacles are very large, the wings of gray 
hair -droop very low, a perky bow of white gauzy stuff worn 
under the chin comes up very high, and the face is very small, 
it is difficult to tell by the lady’s expression what she may be 
feeling; indeed, there is remarkably little room for an expres- 
sion to be revealed; which adds to the mystery of the Chap- 
eron’s personality. 

“Are they out ?” asked Starr. 


202 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Yes. But they promised to be back at a quarter to ten, 
without fail, or I shouldn’t have let them go. Tibe’s had no 
breakfast, and he must have his teeth brushed before we start. 
Oh dear, I’m afraid something’s happened.” 

“For goodness’ sake, don’t be excited. You get such an 
American accent when you’re excited,” whispered the Marin- 
er, fiercely. “Be brave. Remember you’re a Scotswoman.” 

“If I lose Tibe, I shall be a madwoman,” she retorted. 

“You won’t lose him. Alb and I care at least as much for 
the girls as you do for your dog, and we’re not worrying ” 

“That’s different. The girls don’t belong to you,” almost 
wept the tiny creature. “You haven’t fed them, and brushed 
them, and washed their feet every day of their lives since they 
were a few months old, as I have with Tibe, and if you’re not 
very nice to me, you never will.” 

“We never dared hope for quite as much as that,” said 
Starr, “but we are being nice to you. What do you want us 
to do ? They’re half an hour behind time. Shall we give an 
order for the Town Crier ? I dare say there’s one in use still, 
as this is Holland.” 

“If you’re sarcastic, Ronald, I’ll leave you the moment I 
have my darling Tibe again,” replied the Chaperon, and the 
threat reduced Ronald to crushed silence. 

“What took them out so early in the morning ?” I asked. 

“Oh, Tibe es.caped from my room for a minute, and was 
eating a boot which he found at somebody’s door — a horrid, 
elastic-sided boot: I’m sure it couldn’t have been good for 
him — and the two girls brought him back. They were going 
out for one last glimpse of that quaint, hidden square you call 
‘the village,’ which they longed to see again, and they asked 
if they should take Tibe, so I said yes, as he’s fond of driving. 

“Oh, they were driving ?” said I. 

“Yes. They could easily have been in long ago. There 
must have been an accident. Miss Rivers is always so de- 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 203 
pressingly prompt. Such a strange girl! She considers it 
quite a sin to break a promise, even to a man, and she seems 
actually to like telling the truth.” 

We soothed the Chaperon’s fears as well as we could; but 
when half-past ten came, and there were still no signs of the 
missing ones, we both began to be troubled. 

"If they don’t appear in ten minutes. I’ll drive slowly in 
the direction by which they should return,” I said; but the 
words had hardly left my lips when the girls walked into the 
hall, with Tibe. Both charming faces were flushed, and it was 
evident that something exciting had happened. But whatever 
it was, nobody was the worse for it. Tibe flew to his mistress, 
knocking down a child, and almost upsetting an old gentleman 
by darting unexpectedly between his legs, while the girls 
rushed into explanations. 

“We’re so sorry to have kept you waiting, but we’ve had 
such an adventure!” cried Nell. “We were driving back from 
the ‘village,’ when Tibe gave a leap and jumped out of the 
cab before we could hold him.” 

“We were terrified ,” broke in Phyllis. 

“And he disappeared in the most horribly mysterious way,” 
finished Nell. 

“We thought some one in the crowd must have stolen him, 
so we stopped the cab ” 

“And began tearing about looking for him, asking every 
human being in every known language except Dutch, if they’d 
seen a dog, or a chien , or a hund ” 

“But nobody understood, so we went into a lot of shops, 
and he wasn’t in any of them ” 

“And we were in despair. We shouldn’t have dared come 
back without him ” 

“I should think not!” cut in the Chaperon. 

“And we were on the way to the nearest police-station, 
with a dear old gentleman who could speak English, and a 


204 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

whole procession of extraneous creatures who couldn’t, when 

we saw Tibe, calmly driving in a carriage with ” 

“A strange man, and ” 

“He never so much as looked at us, but we were sure we 
couldn’t be mistaken, at least Nell was: so we deserted our old 
gentleman, and began running after Tibe’s carriage, shrieking 
for it to stop.” 

“Naturally, every one thought we were mad; but we didn’t 
care, and at last the man in the carriage realized we were after 
him. If he hadn't stopped, we should have known that he’d 
deliberately stolen Tibe; but he did stop, and we said, both 
together, it was our dog.” 

“The man took off his hat, and answered in English, such 
a nice man, and quite good-looking, with a big mustache, and 
qliick-tempered blue eyes. He said that the first thing he 
knew, Tibe had jumped into his cab, and he had no idea where 
he came from, as he’d been reading in a guide-book; but the 
strangest thing was, he left certain Tibe had belonged to him 
when a puppy; only his dog wasn’t named Tibe, but John 
Bull — Bully for short, and he sold him to an American, be- 
cause it turned out his wife didn’t like bulldogs in the house, 
she thought them too ugly.” 

“What a cat /” interpolated the Chaperon. 

“Could it be possible that Tibe ever was his ?” asked Nell. 
“He sold his dog just a year ago, when he was six months 
old — ” 

“I bought Tibe ten months ago, poor lamb, for a song, 
because he was ill — he’d been seasick on a long voyage, so I 
nursed him up, and see what he is now,” said Tibe’s mistress. 
“It may be he’d belonged to this man, for it’s always the 
strangest things that are true. Tibe has a wonderful memory 
for faces; but I’m sure if I’d been with him, he wouldn’t have 
run away from me for twenty old masters.” 

“The second queerest thing in the adventure is, that this 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 205 
‘old master’ must be some relation of yours, Lady Mac- 
Nairne,” said Nell. “He gave us his card. See, here it is.” She 
handed it to the Chaperon, who gazed at it through her blue 
spectacles for a moment without speaking; then passed it 
to Starr. “Merely — a relation by marriage,” said she. “Quite 
a distant relation. I never saw this gentleman myself; but I 
believe you’ve met him, haven’t you, dear Ronny ?” 

There is plenty of room on the Mariner’s face for expres- 
sion. He grew red, and his eyebrows were eloquent as he 
looked at the card. “Oh — er — yes, I’ve seen him, I think,” 
he mumbled, “when I was in Scotland last. Odd he happens 
to be here.” 

“He only arrived this morning, on important business,” 
Nell explained. “If it weren’t for that, he would have asked 
to bring us back to our hotel, but it was something that had 
to be attended to without a moment’s delay, so he was obliged 
to leave us at once. He was on the way to the Hotel de 
l’Europe, where he hoped to find the people he’d come to 
seek.” 

No need for me to see that card. I knew well who was the 
hero of the girls’ adventure, and would have guessed without 
the aid of Starr’s expression. He saw that I guessed, and 
turned to me with a look of appeal. 

“Well, at all events, Tibe is safe,” I said, “and we ought 
to start, if we’re to get through our program to-day. Ladies, 
is your luggage ready ? I’ll see that Tibe has a nice bone 
instead of breakfast. He can eat it in the car, going to the 
boat; and as it’s dusty, you had better put on your motor- 
veils when you leave the hotel. Starr and I are going to wear 
goggles.” 

“Alb,” said Starr, as the ladies moved away, “you may 
have a bad heart, but you have a good head. Disguise and 
fight are our only hope. If Sir Alec should recognize me ” 

(“If he should recognize me,” I echoed inwardly.) 


206 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“The game would be up.” 

“Speed, veils, and goggles may do the trick,” said I. 

“But afterwards ? By Jove, what we’re let in for!” 

“We must set our wits to work. Change ‘ Lorelei’s ’ name 
and disappear into space. ” 

Five minutes later we were off, unrecognizable by our best 
friends, and Tibe well hidden, deeply interested in his bone at 
the bottom of the tonneau. But hardly were we away when 
Miss Rivers cried out 

“Oh, look, Nell; there’s Sir Alec MacNairne. Oughtn’t 
we to stop a minute, so that Lady MacNairne ” 

“I’m afraid we haven’t time,” I said hastily, and put on 
speed, as much as I dared in traffic. We whizzed by a cab, 
and might have passed the gloomy-faced man who sat in it 
with his traveling-bag (hastily packed, I’ll warrant) had not 
the two girls bowed. 

Their faces were not to be recognized behind the small, 
triangular talc windows of the silk and lace motor- veils they 
bought in Haarlem; but their bow attracted Sir Alec Mac- 
Nairne’s attention, and those “quick-tempered blue eyes” of 
his looked the whole party over as he lifted his hat from his 
crisply curling auburn hair. He probably divined that the 
two veiled figures must be the girls of his late adventure; and 
as he was now acquainted with them and with Tibe, there 
would be one less chance of our boat slipping away from under 
his nose, in case he got upon our track. 

I realized that Sir Alec could not have been in Scotland 
when the fatal paragraph appeared, which reached our eyes 
only yesterday. If he had been, he could not have arrived in 
Amsterdam to-day. My idea now is that he must have come 
abroad in search of his wife, have seen the Paris Herald at 
some Continental resort, and have rushed off post-haste to 
Holland, expecting to find her. 

Exactly why he should have choosen Amsterdam to begin 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 207 
his quest, is not so clear; but he must have had reason to 
hope that he might get news of Lady MacNairne and my 
(supposed) motor-boat here. Doubtless he will sooner or 
later come upon a clue. If he turns up at the Amstel to 
prosecute his inquiries, he may hear of Tibe, and of the two 
beautiful young ladies. Then he will put two and two together, 
and will be after us — as Starr’s favorite expression is — 
“before we can say knife.” 

At present I have all the sensations of being a villain, with 
none of the advantages. 


XIX 


I T seemed homelike to be on board “ Lorelei ” again, in 
my place at the wheel, with the two girls and the Chap- 
eron in their deck-chairs close by. Starr had been 
meaning to make a sketch of the group under the 
awning, but the dread apparition of his aunt’s husband had 
twisted his nerves like wires struck by lightning, and he could 
do nothing. His is essentially the artistic temperament, and he 
is a creature of moods, impish in some, poetic in others; an 
extraordinary fellow, like no one I ever saw, yet curiously 
fascinating, and I find myself growing oddly fond of him, in 
an elder-brotherly, protecting sort of way. 

Even I have my moods sometimes, though I can hide them 
better than he can ; and this morning I was in the wrong key 
for the idyllic peace and prim prettiness of Broek-in- Water- 
land. I should have liked better to be out on a meer in Fries- 
land, in a stiff breeze; but since it had to be Broek, I made the 
best of it. 

The canal leading to that sleepy little village, which seems 
to float on the water like a half-closed lily, is one of the 
prettiest in the Netherlands. Almost at once, after parting 
from Amsterdam, we turned out of the North Sea Canal; and 
the smoke and bustle of the port were left behind like a 
troubled dream. We lifted a veil of sunbright mist, and found 
ourselves in the country — a friendly country of wide spaces 
such as we passed through in motoring between Amersfoort 
and Spaakenberg; of mossy farmhouses and hayfields, grazing 
cows, and swallows skimming low over little side-canals 
carpeted with vegetation like a netting of green beads. But 

208 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 209 
here the hay was not protected by the elevated roofs of thatch 
we had seen yesterday. It lay in loose heaps of yellowing 
grass, shining in the sun like giant birds’ nests of woven gold; 
and all the low-lying landscape shimmered pale golden and 
filmy green, too sweet and fresh for the green of any other 
country save mine, in mid- July. Here and there a peasant in 
some striking costume, or a horse in a blue coat, made a spot 
of color in the pearl and primrose light, under clouds changeful 
as opal; and each separate, dainty picture of farmhouse, or 
' lock, or group of flags and reeds had its double in the water, 
lying bright and clear as a painting under glass, until our 
vandal boat came to shiver picture after picture. 

As we moved, our progress not only sent an advance wave 
racing along the dyke, but tossed up a procession of tiny 
rainbow fountains, as if we threw handfuls of sapphires and 
diamonds into the water in passing. 

Sometimes we had glimpses of mysterious villages, a line 
of pink-and-green houses stretching along the canal banks 
below the level of the water, shielded by rows of trees trained, 
in the Dutch way, to grow flat and wide, screening the windows 
as an open fan screens the sparkling eyes of a woman who 
peeps behind its sticks. 

These half -hidden dwelling-places inspired Starr to launch 
out in a disquisition upon some of the characteristics he has 
observed among my people. 

“Funny thing,” said Starr, “the Dutch are a queer mixture 
of reserve and curiosity. You don’t see a town or village where 
the windows aren’t covered with curtains, and protected by 
squares of blue netting. But though the beings behind those 
windows are so anxious to live in private, they’re consumed 
with curiosity about what’s going on outside. For fear of miss- 
ing something, they stick up looking-glasses on the walls to 
tell them what happens in the street. ‘ Seeing, unseen,’ is the 
motto that ought to be written over the house doors. ” 


210 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“The Lady of Shalott started the fashion,” said Nell. 

As we drew nearer to Broek-in-Waterland, the landscape, 
already fragrant with daintiness, began to tidy itself anew, out 
of deference to Brock’s reputation. The smallest and rudest 
wooden houses on the canal banks had frilled their windows 
with stiff white curtains and tied them with ribbon. Railings 
had painted themselves blue or green, and smartened their 
tips with white. Even the rakes, hoes, and implements of 
labor had got themselves up in red and yellow, and green 
buckets had wide-open scarlet mouths. 

As we walked to the village, after mooring “Lorelei” at the 
bridge, the girls laughed and chatted together, but involun- 
tarily they hushed their voices on entering the green shadow 
of the little town under its slow-marching procession of great 
trees; and the spell of somnolent silence seized them. 

I think no one coming into Broek-in-Waterland could 
escape that spell. There is no noise there. Even the trees 
whisper, and not the most badly brought up dog would dare 
to bark aloud. 

“Have you noticed,” Nell asked me softly, “that you never 
hear sounds in dreams ? No matter how exciting things are, 
there’s never any noise; everything seems to be acted in 
pantomime. Well, it’s like that here. We’re dreaming Broek- 
in-Waterland as we have other places.” 

“And dreaming each other, too ?” 

“I shouldn’t wonder.” 

“Then I hope nothing will happen to wake me up.” 

Just then we arrived at a dream curiosity-shop which gave 
her an excuse not to answer. 

On the edge of the town it stands, one of the first among 
the little old houses, which look as if they had been made to 
accommodate well-to-do dolls of a century or two ago. Mod- 
estly retired in a doll’s garden, with an imitation stalactite grotto, 
and groups of miniature statues among box-tree animals, its 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 211 
door is always open to welcome visitors and allure them. 
Within, vague splashes of color against a dim background; 
blues that mean old Delft; yellow that means ancient brass; 
and all gleaming in the dusk with the strange values that 
flowers gain in twilight. 

I knew that Nell and Phyllis and the Chaperon would not 
pass by, and they didn’t. 

There was a man inside, but he did not ask us to buy 
anything. He had the air of a host, pleased to show his 
treasures, and the Chaperon feared that I was playing some 
joke when I encouraged them to invade the quaint and 
pretty rooms. 

“I don’t believe it is a shop,” said she. “It’s just an eccentric 
little house, that belongs to somebody who’s away — a dear 
old maiden lady, perhaps, a collector of antiques, for her own 
pleasure. This man’s her caretaker.” 

“She’s strayed into some other dream, maybe,” suggested 
Nell. “She’s lost her way, poor old dear, and can never find 
it again, to come back, so that’s why the things are for sale — 
if they really are. But listen, all the clocks in the house are 
talking to each other about her. They expect her to come, 
and that’s why they keep on ticking, through the years, to 
make the time seem short in passing; for some of them must 
have had their hundredth birthday, long, long ago.” 

“He’s a faithful caretaker then, to keep everything in such 
good order,” said Phyllis. “But perhaps he believes what the 
clocks are saying about the old lady coming back. He’s got 
the sweetest little clean curtains at the windows, and this too 
adorable wall-bed is ready for her to hop into, and dream the 
right dream again.” 

“He’d be mobbed by other Broekites, if he didn’t keep 
things clean,” I answered. “You know, Broek-in-Waterland 
is supposed to be the cleanest place in the Netherlands, which 
is something of a boast, isn’t it ? The saying used to be that, 


212 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

if a leaf dropped off a tree, or a wisp of hay off a passing cart, 
and one of the inhabitants saw it, he ran out of his house and 
threw the dreadful thing into the canal.” 

“Let’s scatter a few bits of paper,” said Starr, “and see 
what would happen.” 

“I’m afraid they’re not as observant or energetic as they 
used to be. I counted three straws on the bricks, coming up.” 

“What wouldn’t I give to have lunch in this house, on that 
charming old mahogany table, with those Delft plates and 
pewter mugs,” sighed Miss Rivers, her eyes traveling over the 
old furniture which, as she said, seems to be ready and waiting 
till the wrong dream shall break. 

“I’m going to take you to lunch somewhere else,” I told 
her. “But you can buy Delft plates and pewter mugs here for 
your own table, if you like.” 

Then some exchange and barter did take place; although 
Nell said it seemed cruel to buy anything and separate it from 
its old friends. One ought to apologize to the things that were 
left for tearing their companions away. 

There was time to step into the nearest cheese factory, and 
to go on and see the old church, I said, if they didn’t mind 
lunching late. Of course they did not; so we strolled into 
the show place of Broek, a large house where cows live in neat 
bedrooms carpeted with something which resembles grated 
cheese. The Chaperon suggested that, after all, it was nothing 
but sawdust, and probably she was right; nevertheless each 
little cubicle in the long row, with its curtained window and 
blue-white wall, looked pretty enough for a fastidious human 
being. We should have lingered looking at the cheeses and 
sniffing dairy smells, but suddenly a tidal wave of tourists 
from an excursion steamer swept in, swamped us, and swal- 
lowed Tibe. He was retrieved after a search, in the doorway 
of the curiosity-shop, whither he had wisely returned to await 
his friends, and we then went on past the meer with its deserted 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 213 
bandstand, to one of the few lovable churches left in my 
country. 

It is whitewashed and bare, but somehow, instead of mak- 
ing it grim, the whiteness has given it a religious look. The 
old canopied rosewood pulpit makes you feel good, though not 
disagreeably good, and the brass-work is a joy. 

“You’ve seen a comic opera cheese factory,” said I, when 
we had left the church. “Now, I’ll show you the real thing, 
and then you shall have lunch. It won’t be conventional, but 
I think you’ll like it.” 

“For heaven’s sake let’s drown our sorrows in cheese, or 
something else supporting, and soon, or we perish,” said the 
Mariner. “Our blood will then be upon your head, and as it’s 
blue, and you’re brown, it won’t be at all becoming.” 

At this, I hurried them on, and presently arrived at a red- 
brick house set in a little garden. The glass of the white- 
curtained windows, and the varnished woodwork of the door 
at which 1 knocked, glittered so intolerably that they hurt the 
eyes, and made one envy the Chaperon her blue glasses. It 
was a relief when the dazzling door flew back to disclose a dim 
interior, and a delightful old lady in a lace-covered gold helmet, 
a black dress, and an elaborate apron. 

“Something to eat ?” she echoed my demand. “But, 
mynheer, we have nothing which these ladies would fancy. 
For you two we could do well enough, for you are men, and 
young. What does it matter what you eat, if it is enough ? 
These ladies will laugh at our fare.” 

“They’ll laugh with pleasure,” said I. “You can give us 
eggs, cheese, bread and butter, and coffee, can’t you, and 
strawberries and cream, perhaps ?” 

“Yes, mynheer, and some fresh cake.” 

“Food for kings and queens, as you’ll serve it, y’vrouw,” I 
assured her; and we flocked into the hall. 

“Would you like to show your friends how we make our 


214 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

cheese, while I get ready the food ?” asked the dame. "If you 
would, I will send for my son to guide you, though you know 
it so well yourself, mynheer, you need no explanations.” 

Her son being one of the principal objects of interest at 
Wilhelminaberg, however, the visit would not be complete 
without his society, and his presence was commanded. 
Promptly he appeared, bringing with him a smell of clover, 
and milk, and new-made cheese; a young man with the long, 
clever nose, narrow blue eyes, and length of upper lip, which 
you can see on any canvas of an old Dutch master. 

Wilhelminaberg is not a show place; few tourists find their 
way there, and it is never flooded by a wave of strangers ; but 
if some of the stage effects are lacking, it is more interesting 
for that reason. 

Starr was captivated with the cows’ part of the house, 
divided from their human companions only by a door. He 
whipped out the sketch-block and small box of colors which 
he alwavs carries, and began jotting down impressions. A 
dash of red for the painted brick walls, and of green for the 
mangers; a yellow blur for the mote-filled rays of sunshine 
streaming through the cows’ white-curtained windows, and* on 
the flower-pots adorning their window-sills; a trifle more 
elaboration for the carpet of sawdust stamped with an orna- 
mental pattern, and the quaint design of the cupboard-beds 
for the stablemen in the wall opposite; a streak here and there 
for the cords which loop the cows’ tails to nails in the ceiling; 
gorgeous spots of crimson and yellow for the piled cheeses. 
And in the adjoining room, the while our guide described in 
creditable English the process of cheese-making, Starr sketch- 
ed him standing before his big blue press, printing out his 
molds with an odd, yellow reflection from the cheese cannon- 
balls heaped on trays, shining up into the shrewd Dutch face. 
Then in came the young wife, with a child or two (pretty dark 
creatures like their mother, with the innocent brown eyes of 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 215 
calves), followed by grandmama in her gold helmet, to say 
that our meal was ready ; and Starr induced them to stand for 
him, though they were reluctant and self-conscious, and it was 
by sheer fascination that he prevailed. 

Never had any of the party except myself seen a room like 
that to which we were summoned for luncheon, and Starr 
could not eat until he had said in a “few words of paint” what 
he thought of its paneled walls, its shelves littered with quaint 
and foolish china, ostrich eggs, shells, model ships, and 
hundred-year-old toys; its ancient brass-handled chests of 
drawers, its extraordinary fireplace, and best of all, its white- 
curtained cupboard-beds; one for grandmama, with a kind 
of trapeze arrangement to help her rise; one for papa and 
mama, with an inner shelf like a nest for baby; and one with 
a fence for a parcel of children. The artist’s cream-eggs grew 
cold while he worked, but it was worth the sacrifice, for the 
result was excellent, and Nell’s admiration gave me, I’m 
ashamed to say, a qualm of jealousy. I have no such accom- 
plishments with which to win her. 

We sat in high chairs with pictures of ships painted on 
backs and arms, while we lunched off willow-patterned plates, 
drank delicious coffee out of cups with feet, and stirred it with 
antique silver spoons, small enough for children’s playthings. 
Afterwards the old lady with the helmet, and the pretty 
daughter-in-law were persuaded to show their winter ward- 
robes, which consisted mostly of petticoats-. There were 
dozens, some knitted of heavy wool, some quilted in elaborate 
patterns, and some of thick, fleecy cloth; but there was not 
one weighing less than three pounds. 

“Do ask how many they wear at a time ?” the Chaperon 
commanded, no doubt with a thought for her mysterious note- 
book, about which I often wonder. 

“I wear eight, summer and winter,” replied the old lady. 
“My daughter-in-law is of the younger generation, and does 


216 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

not put on more than six. Little Maria is allowed only four; 

it is better for children not to carry much weight.” 

The girls looked petrified. “What martyrdom!” exclaimed 
Nell. “Even the Duke of Alva couldn’t have subjected Dutch 
women to much worse torture than that. Eight of these knitted 
and wadded petticoats in summer ! It’s being buried alive up 
to the waist. In the name of civilization, why do they do it ?” 

I passed on the question to the old lady. She and her 
daughter-in-law received it gravely, thought it over for a 
moment, and then replied 

“But we must do it, mynheer; it is the mode. It has always 
been the mode.” 

“Talk of slaves of fashion !” muttered Nell. “If you want to 
find them, don’t look in London or Paris or New York, but 
among the peasantry of Holland !” 

Not one of the three could recover from the shock. They 
seemed stunned, as if all the petticoats at once had fallen 
from the shelves onto their heads and overwhelmed them; 
and even when we had said good-by to Wilhelminaberg, they 
talked in hushed tones of what it must feel like to be clothed 
in eight petticoats. They would probably have gone on dis- 
cussing the subject in all its phases, until we regained the boat, 
if something had not happened. It was just after we passed 
the bandstand in the meer, and Starr had wondered aloud if 
the inhabitants of Broek ever did revel so giddily and publicly 
as to come outside their gardens to hear music, when there 
was a loud splash, followed by a cry. 

The splash was Tibe’s, the cry his mistress’s, and in an 
instant we were in a flutter, for the dog was in the lake. 

Close to shore the water is coated over with lily-pads, 
mingling with a bright green, beady vegetation; and Tibe 
mistook it for a meadow. Standing at a considerable elevation 
on the road above, he leaped down with happy confidence, 
only to be deceived as many wiser than he have been, by 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 217 
appearances. Bulldogs have virtues all their own, but they 
are not spaniels; and there was despair in Tibe’s brown eyes, 
as he threw one last look of appeal at his friends before dis- 
appearing under the green carpet. 

Up he came in a second, covered with green beads, his 
black mouth choked with them. Although not a water-dog, 
instinct kept him afloat, and he began to swim awkwardly, 
forging farther from shore instead of nearer. In a moment he 
had tangled his legs among thick-growing, ropey stems of 
water-lilies, and frightened and confused at finding himself a 
prisoner, went down again under the green surface. 

Meanwhile his mistress was half mad with fright, and 
would not listen to Starr’s assurance that the dog was in no 
danger. 

“He’ll bob up serenely and swim close to us; then I’ll hook 
my stick in his collar and pull him out,” the Mariner said 
cheerfully; but she pushed him away, sobbing. 

Now, I never could bear to see a woman cry, even a woman 
in blue spectacles; so I did not wait for Tibe to come up and 
recover presence of mind, as he probably would, but splashed 
down myself onto the green carpet. 

The water hardly reached to my hips, so there was no 
bravery in the feat, and I felt a fool as I went wading out to 
the spot where, by this time, the dog’s head had again appeared 
among the water-lily pads, the living image of a gargoyle. 
But as I hauled him out, with a word of encouragement, the 
poor chap’s gratitude repaid me. Looking like a vert-de-gris 
statue of a dog, he licked such portions of me as he could 
reach with a green tongue, and blessed me with his beautiful 
eyes. 

When I had him on terra firma we both shook ourselves, 
sending an emerald spray flying in all directions; and then 
abortive attempts were made to dry Tibe with the handker- 
chiefs of the united party. A few hurried “Thank you’s” were 


218 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

all I got from the Chaperon at the time, but on board “Lorelei” 

she had something more to say. 

Before starting, I had to go to my stateroom on “Waterspin” 
to change wet clothes for dry ones, and when I was ready to 
take up my part of skipper, no one was on deck save the 
Chaperon and Tibe — a subdued Tibe buttoned up in a 
child’s cape, which his mistress insisted on buying in Amster- 
dam for him to wear in cold weather. 

“My poor darling spattered the girls so much, that they’re 
below taking off their frocks,” she explained. “Mr. Starr’s 
changing too, I think, but I waited to speak to you alone, 
although I am a sight. I have something particular to say.” 

I looked a question, and she went on. “I’ve always liked 
you, from the first. I saw you were the kind of man who could 
be trusted never to injure a woman, no matter what your 
opinion of her might be, and I’d have done you a good turn if 
it had come in my way; but now, after what I owe you this 
afternoon, I’m ready to go out of my way. You won’t think 
I’m an interfering” — she hesitated a moment — “old thing, if 
I say I can guess why you are skipper — why you’re on this 
trip at all. Now, if you wanted to be disagreeable I expect you 
could say that you know why I’m on board ; but I don’t believe 
you do want to be disagreeable, do you ?” 

“Certainly not,” said I, laughing. “And even if I did, 
there’s an old proverb which forbids the pot to call the 
kettle black.” 

“Oh, you and I and my dear nephew Ronny are pots and 
kettles together, the three of us; but our hearts are all right. 
And talking of hearts leads up to what I want to say.” 

“About my job as skipper ?” 

“Yes.” 

“You say you can guess why I took it. My idea is, that you 
guessed the first day on board.” 

“Why, of course I did. I saw which one of the girls it was. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 219 
too, and noticed that something had gone wrong. That inter- 
ested me, for I’m observant. ” 

“You’re ‘ a chiel amang us takkin notes.’ ” 

“Think of a Dutchman quoting that! However, even 
peasants in Holland break into English and German. Why 
shouldn’t a Jonkheer spout Burns ? But let me get to my point. 
I haven’t found out what the trouble is, but I know you must 
have sinned against the girl in some way, or done something 
tactless, which is worse, and made her angry. Or else she felt 
it was her duty to be angry, and has been living up to it ever 
since. Talk of the ‘ way of a man with a maid ! ’ The way of 
a maid with a man is funnier and more subtle. Nell Van Buren 
is an adorable girl, but the more adorable a girl is, the more 
horried she can be.” 

“That is subtle.” 

“Why, of course. What else should it be ? And the whole 
thing’s been as good as a play to watch. I wished you well 
from the beginning, but I thought you capable of taking care 
of yourself.” 

“And now you’ve changed your mind ?” 

“I have, since yesterday. I’m sure something happened at 
Amsterdam in the morning, she was so different. What did 
you do to her ?” 

“I bullied her a little,” I said. 

“I thought as much. How could you ?” 

“I believed it would be good for her.” 

“So it was. But it wasn’t good for you.” 

“She has been angelic since.” 

“That’s the danger-signal. Poor man, you couldn’t see it ?” 

“I was rather encouraged — though it seemed too delightful 
to be true,” I admitted. 

“Men are blind — especially when they’re in love. You 
understand motor-boats better than you do girls.” 

“I dare say,” I said meekly. 


220 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“She’s so nice to you because she means to punish you 
by-and-by, for humbling her pride. I’m warning you, as a 
reward for saving my treasured lamb. If Tibe hadn’t fallen 
into the water, and you hadn’t pulled him out, perhaps I’d 
have left you to founder, and watched the fun. But now I say, 
take care. She’s dangerous.” 

“How can you tell ?” I asked. 

“How can I tell ? Because I’m a woman, of course, and 
because I should act just the same — if I were young.” 

“Well, if you’re right, what am I to do ?” 

“That’s what I want to talk to you about. You must pretend 
to be tired of her. ” 

“Good heavens !” 

“She mustn’t see that she has any power over you. She 
cares for you more than she lets herself think. ” 

“I wish to goodness I could believe that. ” 

“There’s no use in your believing it. The thing is, to make 
her believe it — make her find it out, with a shock. And there’s 
only one way of doing that. ” 

“What ?” 

“Rouse her to jealousy.” 

I laughed bitterly. “Tell me to get her the moon.” 

“Flirt with Miss Rivers.” 

“My dear madam, you’ve proved to me that I’m a fool; 
but I’m neither cad nor hypocrite.” 

“Dear me, if that's the way you’re going to take it, you’re 
lost. Our dear Ronny will snatch her from under your nose, 
although she isn’t a bit in love with him, and is with you, if 
you’d consent to shake her up a little.” 

“Starr is in love with them both.” 

“He was; or rather he was in love with being in love. But 
because you want Miss Van Buren, out of pure contrariness 
he thinks now that he wants her. Beware of her kindness. If 
you should be deluded by it into proposing, she’d send you 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 221 
about your business, and perhaps accept the other man because 
she was wretched, and didn’t quite realize what was the 
matter.” 

“You’re a gloomy prophetess,” I said miserably. 

“You won’t take my advice ?” 

“No. I can’t do that. I must do the best I can for myself in 
some other way.” 

“There isn’t any other.” 

“I shall try.” 

“Well, promise me you won’t propose for a fortnight, any- 
how; or until I give you leave.” 

“We — all — always — do whatever you wish us to, extra- 
ordinary lady. I wonder why ?” 

“You must go on wondering. But in the meantime I will — ” 

“You will ” 

“Try to save you — as you saved Tibe.” 


XX 


T HE Mariner was restless when we landed at the 
strange town of Monnikendam, and had the air — 
or I imagined it — of expecting something. As we 
walked through the wide Hoog Straat, he glanced 
absent-mindedly at the rows of beautiful seventeenth century 
houses, as if he feared to see Sir Alec MacNairne spring from 
behind some ornamented, ancient door, to accuse him as a 
perjured villain. Even the exquisite church tower, which has 
the semblance of holding aloft a carved goblet of old silver, 
did not appeal to him as it would if he had not been pre- 
occupied. And instead of laughing at the crowds of children 
who clattered after us, waking the clean and quiet streets with 
the ring of sabots, he let them get upon his nerves. The girls 
were amused, however, and said that the little pestering voices 
babbling broken English without sense or sequence, were like 
the voices of the story in the “ Arabian Nights” — haunting 
voices which tempted you to turn round, although you had 
been warned beforehand that, if you did, you would lose your 
human form and become a stone. 

Tibe was the real attraction; a sadder and wiser Tibe than 
the Tibe of an hour ago, so sad and so wise that he did not 
even attempt to insist upon, a friendship with three snow-white 
kids which joined the procession of his admirers. 

Starr walked beside his aunt, as if to protect her in case of 
need; and once or twice when I tried to attract their attention 
to some notable fa9ade or doorway, they were absorbed in 
conversation, and might as well have been in New York as in 
Monnikendam on the Zuider Zee. 

222 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 223 

When I had shown the party what I thought best worth 
seeing, I had to leave them to their own resources, and go 
alone to the boat. Hendrik could not navigate “Lorelei” and 
her square-shouldered companion through the series of locks 
by which the canal pours its soul into the heart of the Zuider 
Zee. 

It took me half an hour to do it, and when I had brought 
the two craft to the last of the sea-locks, the four people and 
the one dog were waiting for me, the most persistent of the 
children hovering in the distance. 

“It’s a bigger town than Broek-in-Waterland, but not as 
interesting,” said the Chaperon, looking back disparagingly in 
the direction of Monnikendam, “nor as clean. I saw five bits 
of paper in as many streets, and a woman we met didn’t appear 
at all inclined to commit suicide because she’d desecrated the 
pavement by upsetting a pail of milk : whereas in Broek she’d 
have been hauled off to prison. Each house in Broek looked 
like a model in jewelry, and the whole effect was like a pre- 
sepio cut in pasteboard ; but the Monnikendam houses are big 
enough for people to lie out straight in, when they go to bed, 
which seems quite commonplace. Except for that church 
tower, and a few doorways, and the wonderful costumes, and 
the shoe-shop where they sell nothing' but sabots, I don’t see 
why we bothered to stop at Monnikendam.” 

“I thought you were keen to visit the Dead Cities of the 
Zuider Zee,” said I. 

She stared at me as blankly as if she had not been proph- 
esying my doom a little while ago. 

“What’s that got to do with Monnikendam ?” she demand- 
ed. 

“Only that Monnikendam is one of the Dead Cities; your 
first,” I explained; but she cried incredulously 

“Monnikendam a Dead City of the Zuider Zee ? Say it 
isn’t true.” 


224 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I’m afraid it is.” 

“Oh, then I am disappointed ! I thought we should come 
to the Dead Cities along the shore of the sea. That we’d see 
grass-grown streets lined with empty houses fallen half to 
pieces, and that perhaps if the water were clear we could look 
down, down, and spy steeples and ruined castles glimmering 
at the bottom. Won’t some be like that ?” 

“Not one,” I said. “They won’t be any deader than Monni- 
kendam, which was once the playground of merchant princes. 
I thought it was dead enough.” 

“Not to please me,” she answered, with the air of a Madame 
Defarge in blue spectacles. 

The Mariner came up before we had got into open sea. 
For the moment the three ladies were occupied in watching 
Tibe, who had fallen asleep in his cape, and was running with 
all his feet in some wild dream, flickering in every muscle, and 
wrinkling his black mug into alarming grimaces. 

“Look here,” said Starr, cautiously, “do you think we can 
paint out the name of ‘ Lorelei ’ when we get to Volendam, or 
must we engage a man to do it ? Of course, if we could, it 
would cause less remark, especially if we did the job in the 
evening or early morning.” 

“What! you took that idea of mine seriously ?” I asked. 

“Certainly. It was a brilliant one.” 

“I doubt if Miss Van Buren would consent,” said I. 

“She has, already.” 

“By Jove ! What excuse did you make for asking her ?” 

“I didn’t ask her. What I did was to put the notion into 
darling Auntie’s head. I knew after that, the thing was as good 
as done. I remarked in my vaguest way that it was a wonder 
some catastrophe hadn’t happened to Tibe or other less 
important members of the party, on board a boat named 
* Lorelei.’ I didn’t exactly say it was an unlucky name, but 
somehow or other she seemed to think so at the end of our 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 225 
conversation. Then she had a conversation with Miss Van 
Buren; and the consequence is that the sooner ‘Lorelei’s’ 
name is changed to ‘ Mascotte ’ the better the owner will be 
pleased; and no questions asked.” 

“By Jove !” said I, again. There’s something uncanny about 
the Mariner’s adopted relative. I would give a good deal to 
know what she’s planning to do for me; for if she has decided 
that my name had better be painted on or off any heart of her 
acquaintance, I have little doubt it will be. 

Once out of the sluice, we were immediately in the Zuider 
Zee, whose yellow waves rocked “Lorelei” as if she were a 
cradle, causing the barge to wallow heavily in our wake. Should 
the weather be rough at any time when we have seaports to vis- 
it, “Lorelei” and her consort will have to lie in harbor, and the 
party must be satisfied to do the journey on a commonplace 
passenger-boat. But on such a day as this there was no danger, 
no excuse for seasickness, although I half expected the ladies 
to ask if we were safe. Apparently, however, the doubt did not 
enter their heads. So far we have had neither accident nor 
stoppage of any kind, and they have ceased to think it possible 
that anything can happen to the motor. 

Marken, with its tall-spired church, soon appeared to our 
eyes, the closely grouped little island-town seeming to float on 
the waves as San Giorgio Maggiore does at Venice, in the sun- 
set hour. 

In spite of my sneers at the island theater and its per- 
formers, eagerness betrayed itself in the manner of my pass- 
engers, as we approached Marken, full petrol ahead. 

“They see us,” I announced, as we drew near enough to 
make out that a crowd of huge green and yellow mounds 
massed in the harbor were hay-boats. “They’re congratulating 
themselves on an unexpected harvest, as the big audiences 
for which they cater every morning and afternoon in sum- 
mer are gone for the day. When we arrive, there’ll be a 


226 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

stage-setting and a stage-grouping, which would make a 
‘hit’ for a first act in London.” 

Still nearer we came, and now we could see men and 
women and little children playing at unloading the hay with 
pitchforks from boats large and small. It was the prettiest 
sight imaginable, and one felt that there ought to be an 
accompaniment of light music from a hidden orchestra. 

The men were dressed in black and dark blue jerseys, or long 
jackets with silver buttons, and enormously loose trousers, 
each leg of which gave the effect of a half-deflated balloon. 
At their brown throats glittered knobs of silver or gold, and 
there was another lightning-flash of precious metal at the 
waist. Their hair was cut straight across the forehead, over the 
ears and at the back of the neck, as if the barber had clapped 
on a bowl and trimmed round it ; and from under the brims of 
impudent looking caps, glowed narrow, defiant blue eyes. 

But though the men are well enough as pictures, it is the 
women and children of Marken who have made the fortune 
of the little island as a show place; and to-day they were at 
their best, raking the golden hay, their yellow hair, their 
brilliant complexions, and still more brilliant costumes dazzl- 
ing in the afternoon sunlight. 

We landed, and nobody appeared to pay the slightest 
attention to us. That is part of the daily play; but I was the 
only one who knew this, and seeing these charming, wonderful 
creatures peacefully pursuing their pastoral occupations as if 
there were no stranger eyes to stare, I was reproached for my 
base insinuations. 

“How could you call them ‘sharpers’?” cried Phyllis. 
“They’re loves — darlings. I could kiss every one of them. 
They have the most angelic faces, and the children — why, 
they’re cherubs. ” 

It was true. The picture was idyllic, if slightly sensational 
in coloring. There was scarcely a woman who was not pretty; 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 227 
and a female thing must be plain indeed not to look charming 
in the gorgeous costume of Marken. The snow-and-rose com- 
plexions, the sky-blue eyes, the golden fringe, and two long 
yellow curls, one on either side the face, falling to the breast 
from under tight-fitting mob caps covered with lace; the short, 
very full blue and black skirts ; the richly embroidered bodices, 
brilliant as the breast of a parrot; the filmy fichus and white 
sleeves; the black sabots with painted wreaths of roses, turned 
the little harbor of Marken into a rare flower-garden. The 
expressions of the fair faces were beautifully mild, also, and it 
was not strange to hear Miss Rivers pronounce the women 
angels and the children cherubs. 

The group at the hay-boats formed the chorus; but we had 
not been on land for many minutes before the principal 
characters in the play began to appear. A young girl, who 
might be called the leading lady, came tripping down to the 
harbor with a tiny child hanging to each hand. All three were 
apparently dressed alike, in rich embroideries and full skirts 
to their ankles, worn over an incredible number of petticoats; 
but I could tell by a small rosette on the cap of the middle 
child that it was a boy. 

The trio approached, smiling seraphically; and it goes 
without saying that the three ladies began petting the two 
fantastic babes. 

“How do you do ? You like see inside a Marken house ?” 
asked the pretty girl, speaking English with the voice of a 
young siren. 

They all answered that they would be delighted. 

“I show my home. You come with me.” 

Starr and I were bidden to follow, and I would not spoil 
sport by letting it be known to the actress that one member of 
the audience was a Dutchman. The charming creature with 
her two bobbing golden curls was knitting a stocking almost as 
long as her little brother, and as she turned to show the way, 


228 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

she never for an instant ceased work. Toiling after her, we 

walked along the dyke where the fishermen’s houses stand in 

rows, hoisted on poles like storks’ nests, out of the reach of 

inundations. 

Needles glittering, our guide led us to the foot of a steep 
flight of steps belonging to a house like all the other houses; 
so much like, that it would seem we were being ushered into an 
ordinary specimen of a fisher-family dwelling; but I knew 
better. 

Now the scene changed. The first stage-setting was Marken 
Harbor with the hay-boats. For the second act we had the 
interior of the honest fisherman’s cottage. And what an in- 
terior it was ! 

In all Europe there is no such place as Marken, no such 
dresses, no such golden curls, no such rooms as these into 
which a coquettishly capped mother with a marvelous doll of 
a baby in her arms, was sweetly inviting us. 

“Only think of these fisher-folk living in such wonderful 
little jewel-caskets of houses !” exclaimed Phyllis, to be echoed 
by murmurs of admiral ion from the others. But I said nothing. 
And it really was like wandering into a fairy picture-book. It 
was impossible to imagine any other house resembling this, 
unless that of Silverhair’s Three Bears. 

The polished green walls were almost hidden with brightly 
colored Dutch placks, and shelves covered with little useless 
ornaments. The chairs were yellow, with roses painted over 
them, and varnished till they twinkled. The family beds in 
the wall had white curtains as crisp as new banknotes, and 
white knitted coverlets with wool-lace ruffles; but as the green 
doors of the beds were kept shut for the day, you would not 
have suspected the elegance within, had not the Siren opened 
them for inspection. Under the door of each bed was placed 
a little red bench, festooned with painted flowers; and as there 
were nine in the family and only four beds, counting the little 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 229 
one underneath for the babies, the disposition of forces at night 
did not bear thinking of. 

All the tables had crocheted white covers, and were decked 
with vases and fresh flowers, glittering brass and pewter 
things, and gay old china. But it was the next room — a 
small one adjoining the big living-room — which roused the 
highest admiration. There was not much furniture, but up to 
the low ceiling the walls were concealed by shelves laden with 
gorgeously painted wooden boxes, little and big. They were 
of all colors and all brightly varnished. Some were plain blue, 
or green, or crimson; others had Dutch or Japanese scenery 
painted on their sides, and the largest could not have been 
more than a foot and a half long, by eight inches in height. 

“This must be where they keep their cake and bread, and 
kitchen stores,” said Miss Rivers; but with a smile the Siren 
began to open the boxes. 

Instead of sugar and spices they contained the family 
wardrobe; folded neck-handkerchiefs in great variety; little 
embroidered jackets for the children; lace-covered caps; 
bodices, and even — in the largest boxes — petticoats. 

The ladies, and Starr also, were charmed with everything, 
especially the dark, secretive loft, as full of suspended fishing 
nets as Bluebeard’s closet was of wives. They had never seen 
such a distracting place as Marken, or such kind and pretty 
people. It was nearly an hour before is occurred to them that 
they had better say good-by, and by that time they knew the 
whole history of the interesting family. 

They shook hands with each one of the nine, including the 
baby, patted the cat and then lingered outside, taking photo- 
graphs. Some of the neighbors — young women and girls, 
with dimples in the roses of their cheeks — drew nearer, as if 
lured by admiration of the ladies. Nell and Phyllis, seeing 
them, beckoned, and the fair creatures obeyed the summons 
with an appearance of shyness. They too, were photographed; 


230 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

and after many politenesses had been exchanged, Starr came 
to ask if I thought the dear things’ feelings would be hurt by 
a small offering of money. 

“They may, and probably will be — if the offering is small,” 
said I, dryly. 

“What are you insinuating ?” exclaimed Nell. 

Meanwhile the Siren, her sisters and brothers, and a num- 
ber of handsome friends of her own age, pinned wary eyes upon 
us. The dimples were in abeyance, for the guileless angels 
guessed the subject of conversation, and were preparing for 
eventualities. 

“I don’t think they’ll refuse money,” I said. “In fact, they 
expect it.” 

“How much ought we to give ?” asked Starr. 

“Whatever you have handy, and whatever you think it’s 
worth,” said I, exploring my pockets for silver. 

“I suppose the family would be delighted with the gulden,” 
suggested Phyllis. “We might hand one child another, to 
divide among her little friends, and buy them sweets.” 

“You can try that, and see if they thank you,” I replied. 

“Why, of course they will,” said the Chaperon. “It’s easy 
to see that they have lovely dispositions, except the little boy 
who was afraid of Tibe, just because he tried in play to bite 
off the button on the back of his cap.” 

I stood still and watched the others reviewing their change, 
putting their bits of silver together to make up the sum de- 
cided upon, as small money is always at a premium. I did not 
add my mite to the fund, for I knew what would happen in 
the end. 

Finally, Phyllis was chosen as emissary for the party. 

“Good-by again,” she said sweetly to our late guide. 
“Here’s something for your little brothers and sisters to re- 
member us by; and will you ask your companions to buy 
themselves some sweets with the rest?” 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 231 

But in a s.econd the Siren was transformed into a harpy. 
Her blue eyes turned to steel, and shot lightning. The children, 
understanding the situation, stood by looking like little sharks, 
and the handsome friends suddenly assumed the air of fierce 
wild birds in the Zoo, just tame enough to eat out of your 
hand if you offer what they like, but hating and scorning you in 
their cold hearts — the bright-plumaged things; ready to bite 
your finger to the bone, should you tease instead of feed them. 

Our guide held up a hand with all her fingers spread out. 
“Five! Five!” she demanded shrilly. “Every one of you give 
one gulden. All this you gave is to my friends. Not enough for 
me. I have more. I always have more. One gulden every 
person.” 

“Nonsense,” said I in Dutch. “Here’s another gulden. 
Take that and go away. It’s twice too much for you.” 

I flung her the money, and she clutched it; but she had 
not finished with us yet, nor had the others. Surprised and 
horrified at the sudden change in the pink and white angels, 
the ladies turned away, and hurried toward the boat. For an 
instant the creatures were abashed by my knowledge of Dutch, 
but it was only for an instant. The mother of nine, standing 
in the doorway of the green bandbox house, baby in arms, 
shrieked encouragement to her daughter. The Siren clattered 
after us with angrily ringing sabots, raging for money; the 
children cried; the friends shouted frank criticisms of our 
features, our hats, our manners. I would have gone away 
without rewarding their blackmail with another penny; but in 
desperation Starr turned and dashed four or five gulden at the 
crowd. The coins rolled, and the bright beings swooped, more 
than ever like a flock of gaudy, savage birds in their greed. 

Thus we left them, and I saw that the ladies were thankful 
to be safe aboard “Lorelei” again. 

“Fiends!” gasped the Chaperon, gazing shoreward in a 
kind of evil fascination. “And we called them angels and 


232 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

cherubs! I think you are good, Jonkheer, not to say* ‘I told 

you so/ * 

“They’re terrible — beautiful and terrible,” said Starr, 
“like figures that have been brought to life and have sprung at 
you out of a picture, to suck your blood — in answer to some 
wicked wish, that you regret the minute it’s uttered.” 

“It was a shock to be undeceived, just at the last!” sighed 
Phyllis. “My nerves are quite upset.” 

“I shall dream of them to-night,” said Nell; “so don’t be 
surprised, everybody, if you hear screams in the dark hours. 
Still, I’m glad we went; I wouldn’t have missed it.” 

“Nor I,” added the Chaperon. “I feel as if we’d paid a visit 
to some village of the Orient, and been repulsed by savages 
with great slaughter. And — I wasn’t going to mention it if 
they’d stayed nice, it would have seemed so treacherous ; but 
did you notice, in that wonderful little waxwork house, there 
was no visible place to wash ? ” 

“They don’t wash,” said I, “except their hands and faces. 
Most Dutch peasants consider bathing a dirty habit. They 
say they are clean, and so, of course, they don’t need to bathe. ” 

“That makes them seem more like birds than ever,” ex- 
claimed Nell; “their clothes are only plumage. I think of them 
as real people living real lives. It’s true, Marken’s a theater, 
three thousand meters long and a thousand meters wide, and 
you pay the actors for your seats. The harbor itself isn’t half 
as picturesque as Spaakenberg, with its crowding masts and 
brown haze of fishing-nets; but the people are worth paying 
for. ” 

“Tourists like ourselves have spoiled them; they were 
genuine once,” I said. “Probably Spaakenberg, which is so 
unsophisticated now, will be like Marken one day; and even 
at Volendam, though the people have ke,pt their heads (which 
shows they have a sense of humor), they’re not unaware of 
their artistic value. 


RUDOLPH BREDERODE’S POINT OF VIEW 233 

“They look down on the islanders as theatrical; but it’s 
partly jealousy. Marken has a history, you know; it was once 
connected with the mainland, but that Tvas as long ago as the 
thirteenth century, and ever since the inhabitants have prided 
themselves on their old customs and costumes. They’re proud 
of the length of time they’ve dared to be Protestant; and no 
Marken man would dream of crossing to Papist Volendam for 
a wife, though Volendam’s celebrated for beautiful girls. Nor 
would any of the ‘fierce, tropical birds,’ as you call them, 
exchange their island roost for the mainland, although Mark- 
en, in times of flood, is a most uncomfortable perch, and the 
birds have to go about in boats. But here we come to Volen- 
dam, and you’ll be able to make up your mind which of the 
two fishing- villages is more interesting.” 

We had crossed the short expanse of sea, and passing a 
small lighthouse were entering a square harbor lined with 
fishing-boats. Stoutly built, solid fishing-boats they were, 
meant for stormy weather; and their metal pennons, which 
could never droop in deadest calm, flew bravely, all in the 
same direction, like flags in a company of lances in an old 
Froissart picture. 

“Is Volendam celebrated for tall men as well as beautiful 
girls ?” asked Nell, as we drew near enough to see figures 
moving. “There are several there, but one is almost the tallest 
man I ever saw — except my cousin Robert. ” 

“He looks singularly like your cousin Robert,” added Starr, 
not too joyously. 

“I think it is your cousin Robert,” said I. 

“I’m sure it is your cousin Robert,” murmured Miss Rivers. 

“But why is your cousin Robert here ?” inquired the Chap- 
eron. “Could he have known you were coming ?” 

“I didn’t write to him,” said Nell. 

“I didn’t,” said I. 

Nobody else spoke; but Miss Rivers blushed. 











PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 


XXI 

I WROTE to Mr. van Buren because he asked me to. 
He never approved of the trip, and he said that he 
would be much obliged if I’d drop him a line every 
few days to keep him from worrying about Nell. 

I didn’t mention the conversation to her, as she would be 
sure to think it nonsense, since he lived without hearing about 
her welfare for twenty years, and never gave himself a mo- 
ment’s anxiety. But, of course, that was different. She is in his 
country now, and he feels in a way responsible for her, as if he 
were a guardian; only he can’t make her do things, because he 
has no legal rights. Besides, he is young — not more than five 
or six years older than she is — but I wish I had such a 
guardian. Instead of going against his advice, I would obey, 
and even ask for it. 

Mr. van Buren is the wisest young man I ever met, as well 
as the best looking, and I am vexed with Nell because she 
treats him as if he were a big school-boy. To make up for her 
ingratitude — I’m afraid it amounts to that — I have tried to 
show that I appreciate his kindness. As he’s engaged, I can 
be nice without danger of his fancying that I’m flirting; and 
the poor fellow has seemed pleased with the few little things 
I’ve been able to do by way of expressing our thanks. I wish 
I could believe that the girl he’s going to marry is good 
enough for him, but she is so plain, and seems to have rather 
an uncertain temper. Nell says she is a “little cat,” but I 
should be sorry to call any girl such a name, though I’ve 

235 


236 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

known many cats better looking and more agreeable than 

she. 

I have always been brought up to think it rather rude to 
send postcards, unless they are picture ones for people to put 
in their albums; and of course it would be silly flooding Mr. 
van Buren with pictures of places he has seen dozens of times, 
so when I have written to him, I felt obliged to write regular 
letters. 

I meant to scribble a line or two ; but Holland is so fascinat- 
ing that I have found myself running on about it, and Mr. 
van Buren has seemed grateful because it’s his native land, 
and the places he likes best have turned out to be my favorites. 
In that way we have happened to write each other quite long 
letters, almost every day, for he has wanted to tell me I must 
be sure to see so and so, or do so and so, and I have had to 
answer that I have seen it or done it, and liked it as much as 
he thought I would. 

If our trip could be improved it would be by having Mr. 
van Buren with us; but naturally that’s impossible, as he’s a 
man of affairs, and Freule Menela van der Windt would hard- 
ly sympathize with his kind wish to take care of his cousin, if 
he carried it so far as to leave her for any length of time, 
simply on account of Nell. As it is, his letters, and exchanging 
ideas with him, have been a pleasure to me, and I should have 
liked to share it with Nell — as we always have shared every- 
thing — if I hadn’t been afraid she would laugh. Her cousin 
is too fine a fellow to be laughed at, so I have protected him by 
keeping our correspondence to myself. 

I didn’t want to come to Holland, as it seemed such a 
terrifying adventure for Nell and me to rush away from Eng- 
land and go darting about in a motor-boat; and so horribly 
extravagant to spend all the money poor Captain Noble left, in 
enjoying ourselves for a few weeks. However, it was to be, 
and there is something about Holland which appeals to me 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 237 
more than I dreamed any country except England could. I 
loved it almost from the minute we landed; but when you like 
any person in a foreign place it makes you like the place itself 
better. 

I do think Holland is the most complete little country im- 
aginable. While you are in it, it feels like the whole world, be- 
cause you appear to be in the very middle of the world ; and, 
when you look over the wide, flat spaces, you think that your 
eyes reach to the end of everything. 

And then, all you see is so characteristic of Holland, even 
the sunrises and sunsets. Nothing that you find in Holland 
could be in its right place anywhere else on earth; but perhaps 
one can hardly say that Holland is on earth. Now I’ve got to 
kown the “Hollow Land” (as Jonkheer Brederode often calls 
it), I think if I were kidnapped from England, taken up in a 
balloon, and dropped down here, even in a town I’d never 
seen, and without any canals, I should say, the minute I 
opened my eyes and found my breath, “Why, I’m in dear 
little Holland.” 

I should like to be here in winter. Mr. van Buren says if 
we’ll come he’ll teach me to skate; and, according to Jonkheer 
Brederode, he is a “champion long-distance skater.” But then 
Mr. van Buren told me the same thing about Jonkheer 
Brederode. They are great friends. And talking about the 
Jonkheer, I don’t know what to make of him lately. 

I believed at first that he was in love with Nell, and had 
got himself asked on board “Lorelei” so that he might have the 
chance of knowing her better. She had the same impression, I 
think, though she never said so to me, and she was very angry 
about something Freule Menela told us. It seems there was a 
bet, I don’t know exactly about what, except that Nell was 
concerned in it, and Mr. van Buren mentioned it to his fiancee. 
She oughtn’t to have repeated it to us, but she did, and gave 
the impression that Jonkheer Brederode was a tremendous 


238 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

flirt, who fancied himself irresistible with women. She warned 
us both that if he won his bet, and contrived to meet us again, 
we weren’t to be carried away by any signs of admiration on 
his part, for it was just his way, and he would be too pleased 
if we showed ourselves flattered. 

This made Nell jurious, and she said that in her opinion 
Jonkheer Brederode ought to be flattered if we were in the 
least nice to him, but she for one didn’t intend to be. 

I was a little prejudiced against him, too, although I ad- 
mired him very much when I saw him in the Prinzenhof at 
Delft, and afterwards at the Concours Hippique. I thought 
Nell might, in any case, be grateful to him for saving her when 
the bathing-machine horse ran away with her into the sea. 

I didn’t tell Mr. van Buren what Freule Menela said, for it 
would have been mean, as he might have felt vexed with her. 
But for his sake, as Jonkheer Brederode is such a hero in his 
eyes, I determined if ever we saw the Jonkheer again I 
wouldn’t judge him too severely, and would give him the 
benefit of the doubt as long as I could. 

It was a surprise, though, to find that he was the “friend” 
Mr. Starr had got as skipper, when the real skipper — the 
professional one — failed at the last moment. 

Naturally, I remembered instantly about the bet, which 
somehow concerned his being introduced to Nell within a 
certain length of time — so Freule Menela said — and I 
couldn’t help thinking it was impertinent, winning it in such 
a way on Nell’s own boat. 

However, Nell was so horrid to him from the first minute, 
I grew sorry for the poor fellow, and he took her snubs like a 
combination of saint and gentleman. The more I saw of him 
the more I began to feel that Freule Menela van der Windt 
must have done him an injustice, at least in some of the things 
she told us. 

I try to keep watch over my temper always, and I hope it 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 239 
isn’t too bad; yet I’m certain that in Jonkheer Brederode’s 
place I couldn’t have endured Nell’s behavior, but would 
have stopped being skipper the second day out, even if I left 
a whole party of inoffensive people stranded. Instead of leav- 
ing us in the lurch after undertaking to act as skipper, how- 
ever, he has worked for us like a Trojan. Not only has he 
been skipper, but guide, philosopher and friend — to say 
nothing of chauffeur on shore, and “general provider” of 
motor-cars, carriages, surprise-dinners, flowers, and fruit on 
board the boat. 

The trip would have been comparatively tame, if it hadn’t 
been for him, as none of the rest of us know anything about 
Holland, and he knows everything. No trouble has seemed 
too much for him, if it could add in any way to our happiness; 
and I thought it was all for Nell. 

He looked at her so wistfully sometimes, and such a dark 
red came up to his forehead when she said anything particu- 
larly sarcastic or snubbing, that even if he deserved it I 
couldn’t bear to see him treated so, while he was doing every- 
thing for our pleasure. So I tried to be nice to him, just as I 
have to Mr. van Buren; and, oddly enough, both times with 
the same motive — to make up for Nell’s naughtiness. 

I could see that the Jonkheer was grateful, and liked me 
a little; but the night Mr. van Buren met us at Volendam so 
unexpectedly Lady MacNairne gave Nell and me both quite 
a shock. She said she had it on very good authority that it was 
entirely a mistake about Jonkheer Brederode being in love 
with Nell. Perhaps he had wished to blind people by making 
them think so, but it was really for my sake he had suggested 
to his friend, Mr. Starr, that he should be skipper of “Lorelei.” 

“I won’t go so far as to say,” Lady MacNairne went on, 
“that he’s actually in love with Phyllis” (she calls us “Phyllis” 
and “Nell” now), “but he was so much taken that he wished 
to make her acquaintance. At present it entirely rests with 


240 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Phyllis whether he goes on to fall in love or stops at admira- 
tion.” 

She said this before Nell; and although Nell has behaved 
so hatefully to him (except for the last three or four days, 
when she has been nicer), she didn’t look as much relieved 
as I should in her place. She went very pink, and then very 
pale, with anger at Lady MacNairne for talking on such a 
subject, she explained afterwards. But at the time she didn’t 
show any resentment against Lady MacNairne. She only 
laughed and said, “Dear me, how interesting. What shall you 
do about it, Phil ?” 

“I shall show him that I am his friend ,” I answered decided- 
ly. “I like and admire him, and I hope I shall keep his friend- 
ship always.” 

“That’s a pretty beginning to what may be a pretty ro- 
mance, isn’t it, Tibe, darling ?” asked Lady MacNairne. 

I tried not to blush, but usually the more you try not to 
blush the more you do. It was so with me then, just as it was 
when we were coming into harbor at Volendam, and every- 
body said to Nell, “There is your cousin Robert !” or “Why is 
your cousin Robert here ?” 

I was glad to stoop down and pat Tibe, who is the nicest 
dog I ever knew. It’s true, as Nell says, he is “geared ridicu- 
lously low”; and having such a short nose and stick out lower 
jaw, when he wants to eat or smell things, he has practically 
to stand on his head ; also he can never see anything that goes 
on under his chin. She says, too, that when he’s troubled, and 
a lot of lines meet together at one point in the middle of his 
forehead, his face looks exactly like Clapham Junction; and 
so it does. Nevertheless, he’s beautiful, and has the sort of 
features Old Masters gave dogs in pictures, features more like 
those of people than animals, and a human expression in the 
eyes. 

It is odd, Nell and I used to tell each other every thought 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 241 
we had, and we talked over all the people we knew; but now, 
though I think a good deal about Jonkheer Brederode, and 
wonder how he really does feel toward us both, I never speak 
about him to Nell when I can avoid it, and she never mentions 
his name to me. 

I don’t know what happened to make her suddenly nice 
to him at Amsterdam, but something did, and she is nice still, 
only her manner is different somehow^. I can hardly tell what 
the difference is, but it is there. At first, when we went to 
Spaakenberg and the other places, before Lady MacNairne 
said that thing, she was agreeable to the Jonkheer in a brilliant, 
bewitching, coquettish sort of way, as though she wished after 
all to attract him. But since that evening at the Hotel Spaan- 
der, in Volendam, she has been quite subdued. Jonkheer 
Brederode is quiet and rather distant, too, and sometimes I 
think he speaks to Nell coldly, as if he distrusted such shy 
signs of friendliness as she still shows. 

Now, it seems to me that he and Mr. van Buren and Mr. 
Starr are three friends worth having, not just the accidental 
sort of friends (“friendines” Nell calls that kind) who happen 
to be your friends because you were thrown with them some- 
where, and you would not miss them dreadfully if by-and-by 
you drifted apart. They seem ones you were destined to meet, 
just as much as you are destined to be born, and to die; friends 
intended to be in your life and never go out of it. I scarcely 
knew in the beginning of our acquaintance which of the three 
I liked best; and now that I do know, I’m equally nice to them 
all, because one should do as one would be done by, and I love 
to have people nice to me. 

Mr. van Buren has been with us the last two days, and 
I can see that he watches his friend and me, if we chance to 
be together. I should like to know if he, too, has the idea that 
Jonkheer Brederode cares about me, and, if so, whether he 
wonders how it’s possible for any man to admire me more than 


242 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Nell, who is so beautiful and brilliant and amusing ? I can’t 
help being flattered that such an interesting person as the 
Jonkheer should like my society better than Nell’s, though I 
can hardly believe it’s true. But somehow it would be nice 
to have Mr. van Buren believe it, as then he would be obliged 
to think me quite a fascinating girl, even though it probably 
wouldn’t have occurred to him before — being engaged and so 
on — to regard me in that light of his own accord. 

I should love to talk to Nell about all this in the sweet old 
way we used to have, and I do miss a confidante. Lady Mac- 
Nairne is a most wonderful little woman, who manages every 
one of us, and we would do anything to please her; yet I 
should never dream of confiding in her. I don’t know why, 
unless it’s because she’s all blue spectacles and gray hair. And 
if you never can see what people are thinking about behind 
their glasses, whether they’re sighing over your troubles or 
laughing, how can you tell them sacred things about yourself ? 

Sometimes I think it a pity that Mr. Starr is a man. If only 
he were a girl he would be the most delightful person to have 
for a confidant. In spite of his impish moods, which make him 
seem often like an “elfin boy,” as Jonkheer Brederode says, 
he’s extraordinarily sympathetic. I feel that he understands 
Nell and me thoroughly, and as he is good to look at, and 
clever and fascinating in his manner when he chooses, I 
wonder why neither of us has fallen in love with him. But very 
likely Nell has. If she hasn’t she has been flirting with him 
horribly. 


XXII 


I T was like finding an old friend to see Mr. van Buren 
waiting to meet us at quaint little Volendam. He ex- 
plained that Freule Menela had gone to Brussels to 
pay a visit; so, hearing from me when we would arrive, 
he ran out to inquire how his cousin was getting on. When his 
fiancee came back, he said, he would bring her and his sisters 
to see us. 

Our first sight of Volendam was at sunset. Everything 
seemed so beautiful, and I felt so happy walking up to the 
hotel where we were to spend the night, that I should have 
liked to sing. Great clouds had boiled up out of the west; but 
underneath, a wonderful, almost supernatural light streamed 
over the sea. The sky was indigo, and the water a sullen lead 
color; but along the horizon blazed a belt of gold, and the sails 
on a fleet of fishing-boats were scarlet, like a bed of red ger- 
aniums blooming in the sea. 

It was in this strange light that we walked from the harbor 
up the main street of the village, which is a long dyke of black 
Norwegian granite, protecting little pointed-roofed houses, 
the lower stories of a sober color, the upper ones with the 
peaked gables pea-green or blue, and the sabots of the family 
lying on the door-steps. Here and there in a window were a 
few bits of gaudy china for sale, or a sabot over a door as the 
sign of a shoe-shop; but we hardly looked at the houses, so 
interesting were their inmates, who seemed to be all in the 
street. 

Along the dyke squatted a double row of men, old and 
young — mostly old ; but all as brown as if they had been 

243 


244 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

carved out of oak. Every one had a tight-fitting jersey and 
enormously baggy trousers, like those other men round the 
corner of the Zuider Zee at Marken. But at Marken the 
jerseys were dark and here of the most wonderful crimson; 
the new ones the shade of a Jacqueminot rose, the faded ones 
like the lovely roses which Nell calls “American beauties.” 

There they sat, tailor-fashion, with their legs crossed and 
their cloth or fur caps tilted over their eyes as they smoked 
(very handsome, bold eyes, some of them !) and, passing up 
and down, up and down in front of the row as if in review, 
with a musical clatter of sabots, bands of women, lovely girls, 
and charming little buttons of children. 

Nell and I admired the costumes more than at Marken, 
though they’re not as striking, only innocently pretty. But I 
can’t imagine anything more becoming than the transparent 
white caps that fold back and flare out over the ears like a 
soaring bird’s wings. Perhaps it was partly the effect of the 
light, but the young girls in their straight dark bodices, with 
flowered handkerchief-chemisettes, full blue skirts — pieced 
with pale-tinted stuff from waist to hips — and those flying, 
winged caps, looked angelic. 

They walked with their arms round each other’s waists, 
or else they knitted with gleaming needles. Quite toddling 
creatures had blue yokes over their shoulders, and carried 
splashing pails of water as big as themselves, or they had 
round tots of babies tucked under their arms. But whatever 
they were doing — men, women, girls, boys, and babies — 
all stopped doing it instantly when they spied Tibe. I don’t 
believe they knew he was a dog; and though he has invariably 
had a succes fou wherever we have been, I never saw people 
so mad about him as at Volendam. 

The Jonkheer says there are nearly three thousand inhabi- 
tants, and half of them were after Tibe on the dyke as we 
walked toward the hotel. The news of him seemed to fly, as 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 245 
they say tidings travel through the Indian bazaars. Faces ap- 
peared in windows; then quaint figures popped out of doors, 
and Tibe was actually mobbed. A procession trailed after 
him, shouting, laughing, calling. 

Tibe was flattered at first, and preened himself for admira- 
tion; but presently he became worried, then disgusted, and 
ran before the storm of voices and wooden shoes. We were all 
glad to get him into the hotel. 

Such a quaint hotel, with incredibly neat, box-like rooms, 
whose varnished, green wooden walls you could use for mir- 
rors. I didn’t know that it was famous, but it seems that it is; 
also the landlord and his many daughters. Every artist who 
has ever come to Volendam has painted a picture for the big 
room which you enter as you walk in from the street, and I 
saw half a dozen which I should love to own. 

It was fun dining out-of-doors on a big, covered balcony 
looking over the Zuider Zee, and seeing the horizon populous 
with fishing-boats. In the falling dusk they looked like the 
flitting figures of tall, graceful ladies moving together hand in 
hand, with flowing skirts; some in gossiping knots, others 
hovering proudly apart in pairs like princesses. 

It is wonderful how our chaperon makes friends with 
people, and gets them to do as she likes. If she were young 
and pretty it wouldn’t be strange — at least, where men are 
concerned; but though her complexion (what one can see of 
it) looks fresh, if pale, and she has no hollows or wrinkles, 
her hair is gray, and she wears blue spectacles, with only a 
bit of face really visible. One hardly knows what she does 
look like. Nevertheless, the men of our party are her slaves; 
and it is the same at hotels. If at first landlords say Tibe 
can’t live in the house, the next minute, when she has wheed- 
led a little, they are patting his head, calling him “good dog,” 
and telling his mistress that they will make an exception in his 
case. 


246 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

The morning after we arrived in Yolendam I got up early, 
because Mr. van Buren offered to show me the place if I 
cared to take a walk. It was only half-past eight when we 
strolled out of the hotel, and the first person I met was Lady 
MacNairne. She had been walking, and was on her way back, 
looking like the Old Woman in the Shoe, surrounded by 
children of all sizes. She had made friends with them, and 
taken their photographs, and their grown-up sisters had told 
her lots of things about Volendam. 

She had found out that as soon as the fisherfolk’s sons 
begin to dress like boys, they are given their buckles and 
neck-buttons : the gold or silver knobs which are different for 
each fishing-village of Holland; so that, if a man is found 
drowned, you can tell where he comes from by his buttons. 

She had learned that the trousers are baggy, because in 
storms the men don’t get as wet as in tight ones. That the 
women wear eight petticoats, not only because it’s “the mode,” 
but because it’s considered beautiful for a girl to look stout; and 
besides, it’s not thought modest to show how you are shaped. 

Another thing she learned was that, just as the boys must 
have their buckles and buttons (and ear-rings, if they can get 
them), each Volendam girl, if she wishes to be anybody, must 
have a coral necklace with a gold cross; several silver rings; 
a silver buckle for her purse; and a scent-bottle with a silver 
top and foot. No girl could hope to marry well, Lady Mac- 
Nairne said, without these things; and as the ones who told 
her had no rings or scent-bottles in their collections, she would 
get her nephew to buy them. It wouldn’t do for him to make 
the presents himself, as the girls were proud, though their 
fathers earned only five gulden a week; but she would give 
them, and then it would be all right. One of the girls was un- 
happy, as she was in love with a young fisherman, and they 
were too poor to marry, so she expected to go to Rotterdam 
as a nursemaid. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 247 

“It seems,” said Lady MacNairne, “that Volendam girls 
are in demand all over Holland, as nurses; they’re so good 
to children and animals. But this one won’t have to go, for 
dear Ronny must supply her dot .” 

“Have you asked him ?” I inquired. 

She laughed. “No,” said she. “He’ll do it, though, to please 
me, I know.” 

These things were not all she had found out. She knew 
that Volendam had first been made famous twenty or thirty 
years ago by an artist named Clausen, who came by accident 
and went away to tell all his friends. She knew how the Hotel 
Spaander had been started to please the artists, and how it 
had grown year by year; and all the things that people told 
her she had written in a note-book which she wears dangling 
from a chatelaine. It does seem odd for a Scotswoman, and 
one of her rank, to be so keen about every detail of travel, 
that she must scribble it down in a book, in a frantic hurry. 
But then, many things about Lady MacNairne are odd. 

The sun was blazing that morning, but a wind had come 
up in the night, and beaten the waves into froth. The dark 
sea-line stretched unevenly along the horizon, and there were 
no fishing-boats to be seen. All were snugly nestled in harbor, 
with their gay pennants just visible over the pointed roofs of 
the houses; and we had an exciting breakfast on the balcony, 
because, though it wasn’t cold, the tablecloths and napkins 
flapped wildly in the wind, like big white rings of frightened 
swans. 

Jonkheer Brederode had planned to go northward, skirting 
the coast to see two more Dead Cities of the Zuider Zee, 
Hoorn and Enkhuisen, and cut across the sea to Stavoren on 
the other side, to enter the Frisian Meers. But now he refused 
to take us that way. The men might go, if they liked, he said, 
and there really wasn’t much danger; but in such rough 
weather he couldn’t allow women to run the risk in “Lorelei.” 


248 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“But it wouldn’t be in ‘ Lorelei, ’ Lady MacNairne put in. 
‘Lorelei’ has ceased to exist.” 

Nell grew pink and I think I grew pale. It was an awful 
shock to hear her speak so calmly about the loss of our dear 
boat, of which we have grown so fond. 

“Ceased to exist!” I repeated, cold all over. “Has she gone 
under ?” 

“Only under a coat of paint,” said Mr. Starr, hurriedly. 
“You know, Miss Van Buren consented to humor my aunt, 
who thought the name unlucky, by rechristening the boat 
Mascotte,’ so I did it myself, this morning, thefirst thing, be- 
fore there were many people about to get in my way. ” 

“I’d forgotten,” said Nell. “But if she’s ‘Mascotte’ now, 
isn’t that a sign she could take us safely through the sea ? 
They’re only miniature waves.” 

“You wouldn’t think so if you we're in their midst in a 
motor-boat,” said the Jonkheer. 

“I’m ready to try,” Nell answered. 

“But I’m not ready to let you,” he said, with one of his 
nice smiles. 

However, this didn’t conciliate Nell. In an instant she 
bristled up, as she used to with him, before Amsterdam. 

“It’s my boat,” she said. 

“But I’m the boat’s skipper. The skipper must act accord- 
ing to his judgment. Joking apart though ” 

“I’m not joking. If men can go, why can’t women ? We’re 
not afraid. It would be fun.” 

“Not for the men, if they had women to think of. You see, 
the boat is top-heavy, owing to the cabin superstructure, and 
it wouldn’t be impossible for her to turn turtle in a heavy sea. 
Besides, rough waves might break the cabin windows, and if 
she began to take in water in that way, we should be done, for 
no bailing could help us. Do you still want to make the trip, 
Miss Van Buren ?” 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 249 

“I do,” Nell insisted. “Because I don’t believe those things 
will happen.” 

“Neither do I, or I shouldn’t care to risk your boat. But 
there’s a chance.” 

“I shouldn’t dream of venturing,” said Lady MacNairne, 
“and I’m sure Phyllis wouldn’t go without her chaperon, 
would you, dear ?” 

“No,” I answered; and that mercifully settled it for Nell, 
as she couldn’t take a trip alone with the men. 

“In any case, it’s pleasanter to drive from here to Hoorn 
and Enkhuisen,” went on the Jonkheer, “and the only real 
reason for sticking to the boat even in fine weather would have 
been that you came to ‘do’ Holland in a motor-boat, and 
wanted to be true to your principles. The coast is flat and 
low, and you’d have seen nothing except a line of land which 
would have looked uninteresting across the water, whereas in 
my car ” 

“But your car isn’t here,” objected Nell. 

“It may be, any minute now. I’ve been expecting it for 
the last hour. I wasn’t trusting entirely to luck, when we came; 
and my chauffeur had orders to hold himself in readiness for 
a telegram. Last night, as soon as I saw the wind getting up, 
I wired him in Amsterdam, where he was waiting, to start as 
soon as it was light.” 

“You’re a wonderful fellow,” said Mr. van Buren, and I 
complimented him too; but Nell didn’t speak. 

A few minutes later we heard the whirr of a motor, and the 
buzz of excited voices. We had just finished breakfast, so we 
rushed from the balcony at the back of the house, through the 
big room of the pictures, to the front door; and there was 
Jonkheer Brederode’s car (on the dyke, which is the only road), 
with the smart little chauffeur smiling and touching his cap to 
his master, amid a swarm of girls and boys. 

Bv-and-by it was decided that only Jonkheer Brederode 


250 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

and Hendrik (with Toon on the barge) should test the motor- 
boat’s seaworthy qualities, while Mr. van Buren and Mr. Starr 
stopped with us. This was the Jonkheer’s idea. He would 
prefer it, he said, as the fewer there were on “Lorelei” — alias 
“Mascotte” — the better. And Mr. van Buren ought to be with 
us, to tell us about places. 

I think all the men would have liked the adventure, but 
they couldn’t say that they didn’t want to be of our party, and 
Lady MacNairne actually begged her nephew to come in the 
motor. She didn’t confess that she was afraid for him. The 
reason she gave was that she couldn’t take care of Tibe in the 
car without his help. I was sure she was anxious. Though I 
couldn’t help being glad for his family’s sake that Mr. van 
Buren was safe (as safe as any one can be in a motor-car) it did 
seem sad that Jonkheer Brederode was left to brave the danger 
without his friends. 

All Lady MacNairne’s thought was for her nephew, and so 
I felt it would be only kind to show the Jonkheer that some one 
cared about him. I begged him to let Hendrik manage the 
boat alone, for I said we should all be so worried, that it would 
spoil our drive. I supposed Nell would join with me, as Lady 
MacNairne did, if only enough for civility, but she wouldn’t 
say a word. However, though she pretended to be more in- 
terested in examining the car than listening to our conversa- 
tion, she was pale, with the air of having a headache. 

Jonkheer Brederode was pleased, I think, to feel that some 
one took an interest in him; but he made light of the danger, 
and saw us off so merrily that I forgot to worry. 

Mr. van Buren didn’t want to drive; Mr. Starr doesn’t 
know how; and as Nell said she would like to sit in front with 
the chauffeur, Lady MacNairne and I had the two men in the 
tonneau with us. 

We were gay; but Nell didn’t turn round once to join in 
our talk. She sat there beside the chauffeur, as glum as if she 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 251 
had lost her last friend. Perhaps she was alarmed for her boat, 
as she doesn’t care about the Jonkheer. 

Now we began to see what a Dutch dyke really is, and I 
could imagine men riding furiously along the high, narrow 
road, carrying the news to village after village that the water 
was rising. 

There was just room on top for anything we might meet to 
pass; but the chauffeur drove slowly, and Mr. van Buren said 
there was no danger, so I wasn’t afraid. There was a sense of 
protection in sitting next to him, he is so big and dependable. 
I felt he would not let anything hurt me; and once in a while 
he looked at me with a very nice look. I suppose he has even 
nicer ones for Freule Menela, though, when they are alone 
together. It is a pity her manner is so much against her. 

Although I wasn’t terrified, it was an exciting drive, running 
along on the high dyke (I could hardly believe it when Mr. van 
Buren said there were bigger ones in Zeeland), with the 
Zuider Zee on one side and the wide green reaches of Jonkheer 
Brederode’s Hollow Land on the other. 

I shivered to think what would happen if the hungry sea, 
forever gnawing at the granite pile, were to break it down and 
pour over the low-lying land. Many times in the past such 
awful things happened ; what if to-day were the day for it to 
happen again ? 

I asked Mr. van Buren if he didn’t wake up sometimes in 
the night with an attack of the horrors ; but he seemed anxious 
to soothe me, as if he didn’ t want his country spoiled for me 
by fears. 

“The corps of engineers who look after the coast defenses 
is the best in the world,” he said. 

Edam was our first town; and it was odd to see it, after 
nibbling its cheeses more or less all one’s life, and never think- 
ing of the place they came from. The funniest thing was that 
it smelled of cheese — a delicious smell that seemed a part of 


252 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

the town’s tranquillity, just as the perfume seems part of a 
flower. In most of the pretty old houses with their glittering 
ornamental tiles, there was some sign of cheese-making; and 
all the people of Edam must have been busy making it, as we 
saw only two or three. 

We stopped in a large public square, with a pattern in the 
colored pavement, like carpet, and the place was so quiet that 
the sound of the silence droned in our ears. 

“And this,” said Mr. van Buren, “was once one of the 
proudest cities of the Zuider Zee !” 

“My goodness!” exclaimed Lady MacNairne, “is this little 
old thing another of the Dead Cities ? Well, I’m sure it couldn’t 
have been half as nice when it was alive.” And down some- 
thing went in her note-book. 

We drove by a park, a noble church, and the loveliest 
cemetery I ever saw, not at all sad. I could not think of the 
dead there, but only of children playing and lovers strolling 
under the trees. 

As soon as we were outside Edam we began to pass wind- 
mills quite different from any we had seen before. They were 
just like stout Dutch ladies, smartly dressed in green, with 
coats and bonnets of gray thatch and greenish veils over their 
faces, half hiding the big eyes which gazed alway toward the 
dyke that imprisons the Zuider Zee. 

We had been off the dyke and skimming along an ordinary 
Dutch road for a while; but presently we swerved toward 
the right and were again on a dyke sloping toward the sea. 
Sailing along its level top we could see far off the embowered 
roofs and spires of a town which Mr. van Buren said was the 
once powerful city of Hoorn. 

“Isn’t there a Cape somewhere named after it?” asked 
Lady MacNairne gaily; and Mr. van Buren (answering that 
William Schouten, the sailor who discovered the Cape, named 
it after his native town) looked surprised at her ignorance. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 253 

She doesn’t seem to know much about history, but she will 
know a great deal about Holland before we finish this trip if 
she goes on as she is going now. 

In ten minutes we were in the suburbs; in five more we 
were in the Dead City itself ; but it had the air of having been 
resurrected and being delighted to find itself alive again. We 
passed row upon row of wonderful carts, shaped like the cars 
of classical goddesses, though no self-respecting goddess would 
have her car painted green outside and blue or scarlet within. 

“By Jove, now I know why Brederode was so keen on our 
getting off early and not waiting at Volendam till to-morrow 
for the wind to die!” exclaimed Mr. van Buren. “What a 
fellow he is to think of everything ! This is the one and only 
time to find Hoorn at its best — market-day. And now you 
will see some nice things.” 

He had the chauffeur slow down the car in a fascinating 
street, with quaint houses leaning back or sidewise, and bear- 
ing themselves as they pleased. 

“Which way for the cheese market ?” Mr. van Buren asked 
an old man with a wreath of white fur under his chin. 

He asked in Dutch, but so many Dutch words sound like 
caricatures of English ones that I begin to understand now. 
Besides, I have bought a grammar and study it in the eve- 
nings. This pleased Mr. van Buren when I told him, and he 
says I have made splendid progress. I’ve got as far as “I love, 
you love, he loves,” and so on. I think Dutch an extremely 
interesting language. 

The old man told us which way to go, and turning up a 
street we should never have thought of, we came out in a huge 
market-place presided over by a statue of Coen, a man who 
founded the Dutch dominion in the West Indies, or something 
which Mr. van Buren thought important. 

We have often wondered where the people of the towns 
hide themselves; but there was no such puzzle in Hoorn. 


254 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

The market-place looked as if half the population of North 
Holland might be there. The whole of the square was covered 
with cheeses, large shiny cheeses, yellow as monstrous oranges. 
They glittered so radiantly in the sunlight that you felt they 
might at any instant burst out into a flame. Between the great 
glowing mounds little paths had been left, and along these 
paths walked lines of solemn men inspecting the burning 
globes and bargaining with their possessors ; while outside the 
huge, cheese-paved space there was a moving crowd, gay and 
shifting as the figures made by bits of colored glass in a kalei- 
doscope. 

We expected to create a sensation with the motor, but the 
cheeses were more interesting, and nobody had time for more 
than a glance at us. Suddenly, as we sat gazing at the scene, 
affairs in the market-place came to some kind of crisis. A 
stream of men appeared, dressed in spotless white from head 
to foot, and wearing varnished, hard straw hats of different 
colors. Soon, we saw it was the hats which determined every- 
thing. The blue-hatted men walked together; the red hats 
formed another party; the yellow hats a third; and so on. 
Each corps carried large yet shallow trays suspended from 
their shoulders — two men to a tray — and falling upon the 
piles of cheeses they gathered them up with incredible quick- 
ness. Then, when the trays were loaded with a pyramid of 
cheeses, off rushed the men to a wonderful Weigh House which 
Mr. van Buren says is famous throughout all North Holland. 
Inside were many men, busy as bees, weighing cheeses with 
enormous scales. Down dropped the trays; the weight was 
taken, and away darted the men bearing the yellow treasures 
to some neighboring warehouse. 

We watched the weighing for a long time, until we were so 
hungry that we could feel no enthusiasm for anything except 
lunch. But as we drove through crowded streets to a hotel, 
it was interesting to pass warehouses where cheeses were being 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 255 
stored. The porters with the bright hats (worn to denote their 
ancient guilds) were standing on the pavement tossing up 
cheeses, like conjurors keeping a lot of oranges in the air. 
Men above, standing in open lofts, caught the golden balls as 
they flew up, and stored them among crowds of others that 
seemed to illuminate the dim background like half-extinguish- 
ed lanterns glowing in the dark. 

We lunched at an old-fashioned hotel with enormous rooms ; 
and then, as we had time, we wound through the chief streets 
of the Dead City, stopping now and then to study bas-reliefs 
on ancient houses, telling of stirring events when the name of 
Hoorn sounded loud in the world. 

There was one stone picture of many old ships in commo- 
tion among impossible waves, and the description was all in 
one word — “Bossuzeeslag.” It seemed very impressive to sit 
staring up at it while Mr. van Buren told how “we” whipped 
the Spanishship “Inquisition” after thirty hours’ fighting on the 
sand-bank, and all the people of Hoorn assembled to look on. 

After seeing the house where Graaf Bossu was kept prisoner 
our interest in the Hoorn of long ago was kindled to a blaze. 
Mr. van Buren proposed taking us to the Museum, so we 
all went, except poor Mr. Starr, who sat in front of the hand- 
some building in the motor-car, on “dog duty,” as he calls it. 

I liked the reproduction of an old Dutch inn, and the plans 
of the Dead Cities as they used to be; but the paintings of 
determined-looking burgomasters in black with ruffles and 
conical hats, were pathetic. The men in their short frilled 
trousers and high boots, thought themselves so important, 
poor dears, with their piteous forefingers proudly pointing to 
maps and specifications, that it was sad to see them still doing 
it when all their plans had come to nothing long ago. We 
admired Hoorn as it is, but it would break their hearts if they 
could see it, given up to cheese, and only of importance in the 
cheese world. 


256 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

We were not in the Museum long, but Mr. Starr had 
suffered tortures meanwhile, and looked ten years older when 
we came out. Tibe had been asleep on the floor of the tonneau 
while we were in the market-place before lunch, so nobody 
had seen him. But, deserted by his mistress, he sat up in the 
car to look for her, and the passers-by caught sight of him. 
Word went round that there was a strange monster, a cross 
between a monkey and a goblin, sitting in an automobile, and 
all the people of Hoorn poured into the street to see the show, 
just as they had poured to the harbor more than three hundred 
years ago when the “zeelsag” was going on. 

We came out to find the car almost lost to sight in the 
crush; but Mr. van Buren, who is like a great, handsome 
Viking, pushed the people aside, and said things to them in 
Dutch which made some laugh and others grumble. 

To escape, we drove out of the town into toy-like suburbs, 
with little streets, and tiny houses on dykes, each one with its 
drawbridge across the stream running on either side a dyke- 
road. And now we seemed to be in the heart of toyland. It 
was like a place built by Santa Claus, to come to at Christmas 
time, and choose presents to fill his pack. 

Aalsmeer and Broek-in-Waterland, which we had thought 
toy-like, were grown-up villages for grown-up people compared 
to this toy- world. 

On we went, penetrating further into the doll-country, 
instead of running out of it. The brown, yellow, green, and 
red carts, ornamented with festoons of flowers in carved wood, 
which were returning from market, were the only grown-up 
things we saw — except the trees, and they seemed abnor- 
mally tall by way of contrast. 

Mile after mile, the road to Enkhuisen led on between two 
lines of dolls’ houses and gardens. Some must have been 
meant for very large dolls, but that made no difference in the 
toy effect, as the great farmhouses, apportioned off half for 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 257 
toy animals, half for farmer-dolls, were just as fantastic in 
design and decoration as the tiny ones. 

Backgrounds of meadows, canals, and windmills, I suppose 
there must have been, as every picture has to have its back- 
ground; but backgrounds are seldom obtrusive in Holland, as 
Mr. Starr says; and here the two lines of toy dwellings were 
so astonishing that we noted nothing else. 

For the whole ten miles of the drive we were playing dolls. 
The long, straight string of houses was knotted now and then 
into the semblance of a village, but never was the string broken 
between Hoorn and Enkhuisen, and though we saw so many, 
each new doll-house made us laugh as if it were the first. 

I tried not to laugh at the beginning, lest it might hurt Mr. 
van Buren’s feelings; but he didn’t mind, and pointed out the 
funniest front doors, crusted with colored flowers, like the 
icing on a child’s birthday cake sprinkled with “hundreds of 
thousands.” After that, I laughed as much as I liked at 
everything, though I was sure the people who had built the 
houses took them quite seriously, and admired them beyond 
words. You felt that each man had put his whole soul into the 
scheme of his house, trying to outdo his neighbors in color or 
originality. 

There would be a house with a red-brick front for the 
lower story, and the upper one, including gables, done in wood 
painted pea-green. Then the sides of the house would be in 
green and white stripes, the window-frames sky-blue, the tiny 
sparkling panes twinkling out like diamonds set in turquoises. 
But these would not be the only colors to dazzle your eyes as 
you flashed through the tall Gothic archway of trees darkening 
the road. There would be a three-foot deep band of ultra- 
marine distemper running all round a house, the trunks of the 
trees and the fence would be brilliantly blue, and despite a 
dash of scarlet here and there, as you approached you had the 
impression of coming to a lake of azure water. 


258 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Further on would be another house, yellow and scarlet and 
white, having a door like a mosaic with raised patterns of 
flowers in pink, blue, and purple on a background of gold or 
black; and the high, pointed roof, half thatched, half covered 
with glittering black tiles. 

These roofs made the houses look as if they had bald, 
shiny foreheads, with thick hair on top, and gave the windows 
a curiously wise expression. 

But if the homesteads (with their additions for families 
of horses and cows) were extraordinary, they were common- 
place compared with the chicken or pigeon-houses, shaped like 
chateaux, or Chinese pagodas, wreathed with flowers. 

When at last we drove under a gateway across the road, 
and the color was suddenly extinguished as if a show of fire- 
works were over, we all felt as though we had come back to the 
everyday world after an excursion into elfiand. 

It was the entrance to Enkhuisen, the last of the Dead 
Cities which w r e were to visit — a strange, sad old town, with a 
charming park, churches three times too big for it, and 
beautiful seventeenth-century houses, small but perfect as 
cameos. We drove to the harbor, not only to see the wonder- 
ful humpbacked Dromedary Tower, but to find out whether 
there were any news of our boat, before going to the hotel. 

A stiff wind was blowing; the sea was gray, and waves 
tossed angrily against the breakwater. 

Nothing had been heard of “Lorelei-Mascotte,” and though 
we left the car and walked to the outer harbor, straining our 
eyes in the direction whence she should come, no craft re- 
sembling her was in sight. 

The beauty of the day had died; sky and water were dull 
as lead, and Nell’s face, as she stood gazing out to sea, looked 
pallid in the bleak light. 

Suddenly we felt depressed, though Mr. van Buren said it 
was hardly time to expect news. As we lingered, the most 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 259 
exquisite music began to fall over our heads, apparently from 
the sky, like a shower of jewels. 

“The chimes of the Dromedary,” said Mr. van Buren, 
looking up at the strong, dark tower looming above us. Our 
eyes followed his, and the music sprayed over us in a lovely 
fountain. Had the bells been all of silver, rung by fairies, the 
notes could not have been sweeter. In itself the air was not 
sad, yet it pierced to the heart; and as the chimes played I 
found that I was a great deal more anxious about Jonkheer 
Brederode than I had thought. The tears came to my eyes, 
and when Lady MacNairne asked what was the matter, I said 
impulsively that I couldn’t help being frightened for our 
friend, doing his self-imposed duty so bravely by Nell’s boat. 

Going back to the hotel, we were all miserable. Even Mr. 
van Buren seemed wretched, though I can’t think why, as 
he said he was not anxious about the Jonkheer. And Lady 
MacNairne forgot to put it down in her note-book when 
some one told her that Enkhuisen was the birthplace of Paul 
Potter. 


XXIII 


I SHALL never forget that night at Enkhuisen, or the 
hotel. 

Mr. Starr said it was no wonder Cities of the Zuider 
Zee died, if they were brought up on hotels like that. 
Ours, apparently, had no one to attend to it, except one 
frightened rabbit of a boy, who appeared to be manager, hall 
porter, waiter, boots, and chambermaid in one; but when we 
had scrambled up a ladder-like stairway — it was almost as 
difficult as climbing a greased pole — we found decent rooms, 
and after that, things we wanted came by some mysterious 
means, we knew not how. 

It was an adventure sliding down to dinner. Tibe fell from 
top to bottom, into a kind of black well, and upset Lady 
MacNairne completely. She said she hated Enkhuisen, and 
she thought it a dispensation of Providence that the sand had 
come and silted it up. 

We had quite good things for dinner, but we ate in a dining- 
room with no fresh air, because the commercial travelers who 
sat at the same table, with napkins tucked under their chins, 
refused to have the windows open. Mr. van Buren wanted to 
defy them, but his chin looked so square, and the commercial 
travelers’ eyes got so prominent, that I begged to have the 
windows left as they were. 

There are churches to see in Enkhuisen, and a beautiful 
choir screen, but we hadn’t the heart to visit them. We said 
perhaps we would go to-morrow, and added in our minds, “if 
the boat is safely in.” 

The Rabbit hardly knew what we meant when we asked for 
260 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 261 
a private sitting-room, and evidently thought it far from a 
proper request. 

To add to our melancholy, a thunder-storm came up after 
dinner, and lightning looped like coils of silver ribbon across 
the sky and back again, while thunder deadened the chimes of 
the Dromedary. Still there was no news, and at last Mr. van 
Buren went out in torrents of rain to the harbor. 

We could not bear to sit in the dining-room where the 
commercial travelers — in carpet slippers — were smoking 
and discussing Dutch politics, so we clambered up the greased 
pole to Lady MacNairne’s room, and talked about Philip the 
Second, and tortures, while Tibe growled at the thunder, and 
looked for it under furniture and in corners. 

Nell was in such a black mood that she would have liked 
Philip to be tortured through all eternity, because of the 
horrible suffering he inflicted on the people of Holland ; but I 
said the worst punishment would be for his soul to have been 
purified at death, that he might suddenly realize the fiendish- 
ness of his own crimes, see himself as he really was, and go on 
repenting throughout endless years. 

It was not an enlivening conversation, and in the midst 
Mr. van Buren came to say that there were no tidings of 
Jonkheer Brederode and the boat. 

Then Nell jumped up, very white, with shining eyes. 
“ Can’t we do something ?” she asked. 

Her cousin shook his head. “What is there we can do ? 
Nothing ! We must wait and hope that all is well.” 

“Are you anxious now ?” asked Lady MacNairne. 

“A little,” he admitted. 

“I don’t know how to bear it,” exclaimed Nell, with a choke 
in her voice. 

I longed to comfort her; but her wretchedness seemed only 
to harden her cousin’s heart. 

He looked at her angrily. “It is late for you to worry,” he 


262 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

reproached her. “If you had shown concern for Rudolph's 
safety this morning it would have been gracious; but ” 

“Don’t!” she said. 

Just the one word, and not crossly, but in such a voice of 
appeal that he didn’t finish his sentence. 

We sat about awkwardly, and tried to speak of other things, 
but the talk would drift to our fears for the boat. Nell did 
not join in. She sat by the window, looking out and listening 
to the rain and wind, which made a sound like the purring 
of a great cat. 

Ten o’clock came, and Lady MacNairne proposed that, as 
we could do nothing, we women should go to bed. 

Then Nell spoke. “No,” she said. “You and Phil can do 
as you like, and Cousin Robert and Mr. Starr; but I shall 
sit up.” 

Of course I told her I would sit up, too; and as Mr. van 
Buren said the commercial travelers had left the dining-room, 
he and Mr. Starr and Nell and I bade Lady MacNairne good- 
night, and went down. 

The unfortunate Rabbit was in the act of putting out the 
light, but he was obliged to leave it for us, a necessity which 
distressed him. 

By-and-by it was eleven, and the hotel was as silent as a 
hotel in a Dead City ought to be. We talked spasmodically. 
Sometimes we were still for many minutes, listening for 
sounds outside; and we could hear the scampering of mice 
behind the walls. 

“I can’t stand this,” said Nell. “I’m going to the harbor.” 

“I will take you,” replied Mr. van Buren. 

“No, thank you,” said Nell. “I’d rather you stopped with 
Phil. She has a cold, and mustn’t get wet.” 

“May I go ?” asked Mr. Starr. 

“Yes,” she said. 

So they stole away through the sleeping house, and presently 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 263 
we heard the front door close. Mr. van Buren and I were 
alone together. 

He was good about cheering me up, saying he had too 
much faith in his friend’s courage and skill as a yachtsman to 
be very anxious, though the delay was odd. 

Then, suddenly he broke out with a strange question. 

“Would it hurt you if anything should, happen to Rudolph 
Brederode ?” 

I was so surprised that I could hardly answer at firsts Then 
I said that of course it would hurt me, for I liked and ad- 
mired the Jonkheer, and considered him my friend. 

“I have no right to ask,” he went on, “but I do beg you to 
say if it is only as a friend you like Rudolph.” 

That startled me, for I was afraid things I had done might 
have been misunderstood, owing to the difference of ways in 
Holland. 

“Why,” I stammered, “are you going to warn me not to 
care for him, because he doesn’t care for me ? How dreadful /” 

Nell’s cousin Robert looked so pale, I was afraid he must 
be ill. He put up his hand and pushed his hair back from his 
forehead, and then began pacing about the room. 

“Rudolph must care — he shall care, if you wish it,” he 
said. 

“Oh,” I exclaimed, “I didn’t mean it was dreadful if he 
didn’t care; but if you thought I did.” 

He stopped walking and took one big step that brought 
him to me. 

“You do not ?” 

“Of course not,” said I; “not in that way.” 

Mr. van Buren caught both my hands, and pressed them so 
tightly, that I couldn’t help giving a tiny squeak. 

“Ah, I have hurt you!” he cried, and a strange expression 
came into his eyes. At least, it was strange that it should be 
for me, instead of Freule Menela, for it was almost but no, 


264 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I must have been mistaken, of course, in thinking it was like 
that. Anyway, it was a thrilling expression, and made my 
heart beat as fast as if I were frightened, though I think that 
wasn’t exactly the feeling I couldn’t take my eyes away from 
his for a minute. We looked straight at each other; then, as 
if he couldn’t resist, he kissed my hands one after the other — 
not with polite little Dutch kisses, but eager and desperate. 
As he did it, he gave a kind of groan, and before I could 
speak he muttered, “Forgive me!” as he rushed out of the 
room. 

He must have almost run against Mr. Starr, for the next 
instant the “Mariner” (as Jonkheer Brederode calls him) 
came in, dripping wet. 

There was I, all pink and trembling, and my voice did 
sound odd as I quavered out, “Where’s Nell ?” 

“Gone to her room,” said Mr. Starr, looking hard at me 
with his brilliant, whimsical eyes. “I was to tell you ” 

With that, I burst into tears. 

“Good gracious, poor angel! What is the matter?” he 
exclaimed, coming closer. 

“I don’t know,” I sobbed. “But I’m not an angel. I do 
believe I’m a very — wicked girl.” 

“You, wicked ? Why ?” 

“Because — I’ve got feelings I oughtn’t to have.” 

“And that’s why you’re crying ?” 

“I’m not sure. But I just — can’t help it.” 

“I wish I could do something,” said he, quite miserably; 
and I could smell the wet serge of his sopping coat, though 
I couldn’t see him, for my hands were over my eyes. I was 
ashamed of myself, but not as much ashamed as I would have 
been with any one else, because of the feeling I have that Mr. 
Starr would be so wonderfully nice and sympathetic to confide 
in. Not that I have anything to confide. 

“Thank you, but you couldn’t. Nobody could,” I moaned. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 265 

“Not even Miss Van Buren ?” 

“Not now. It’s too sad. Something seems to have come 
between us; I don’t know what.” 

“Maybe that’s making you cry ?” 

“No, I don’t think so. Oh, I’m so unhappy!” 

“You poor little dove! You don’t mind my calling you 
that, do you ?” 

I shook my head. “No, it comforts me. It’s so soothing 
after — after ” 

“After what ? Has anybody been beast enough ” 

“Nobody’s been a beast,” I hurried to break in, “except, 
perhaps, me.” 

“Do tell me what’s troubling you,” he begged, and pulled 
my hands down from my face, not in the way Mr. van Buren 
had caught them, but very gently. I let him lead me to a 
sofa and dry my eyes with his handkerchief, because it seemed 
exactly like having a brother. It was just as nice to be sym- 
pathized with by him as I had often imagined it would be, 
and I liked it so much that I selfishly forgot he was soaked 
with rain, and ought to get out of his wet clothes. 

“If I knew I would tell you,” I said. 

“You’re worried about Alb — I mean Brederode ?” 

“Oh, now I know I’m a beast! I’d forgotten to ask about 
him, or the boats.” 

“You’d forgotten — by Jove ! No, nothing heard or seen 
yet. I made Miss Van Buren come back at last. Had to say 
I was afraid of catching cold or she’d be there now. But see 
here, as it isn’t Alb’s fate that’s bothering you, may I make a 
guess ?” 

“Yes, because you never could guess,” said I. 

“Is it — anything about van Buren ?” 

My face felt as if it was on fire. “Why, what should it be ?” 
I asked. 

“It might be, for instance, that you’re sorry for him 


266 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

because he’s engaged to a brute of a girl who’s sure to make 

him miserable. You’ve got such a tender heart.” 

“You’re partly right,” I confessed. “Not that he’s been 
complaining. He wouldn’t do such a thing.” 

“No, of course not,” said Mr. Starr. 

“It’s wonderful how that should have come into your 
mind,” I said. “Please don’t think me stupid to cry, but 
suddenly it came over me — such agonizing pity for him. I 
can’t think he loves her.” 

“I’m sure he doesn’t. I always wondered how he could, 
but to-night I saw that his engagement was making him 
wretched.” 

“You saw that ?” 

“Yes.” 

“You’re so sympathetic,” I couldn’t help saying. 

“Am I ?” 

“Yes. Do you know, I feel almost as if you were my 
brother ?” 

“Oh, that settles it ! It’s all up with me.” 

“What do you mean ?” I asked. 

“Whichever way I look I find nothing but sisters. I’ve 
had to promise myself to be a brother to Miss Van Buren, too, 
to-night. ” 

“Don’t you mean you promised her ?” 

“No, for I haven’t done that yet. But it will probably come 
later.” 

“Would you rather not be our brother ?” I hope I didn’t 
speak reproachfully. 

“We — ell, my first idea was that an aunt was the only 
relative I should have with me on this trip. Still, I’d have 
been delighted to be a brother to one of you, if I could only 
have kept the other up my sleeve, as you might say, to be 
useful in a different capacity. ” 

“You love to puzzle me,” I said. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 267 

“There are lots of things I love about you — as a brother, ” 
he answered with a funny sigh. And I wasn’t sure whether 
he was poking fun at me or not. “But, as for Miss Van Buren, 
why couldn’t she look upon van Buren as a brother ?” 

“He’s her cousin, and she doesn’t love him much,” I ex- 
plained. 

“Alb, then.” 

“She doesn’t love him at all.” 

“Are you sure of that ?” 

“Oh, certain,” I assured him quite earnestly. 

“She’s sick with anxiety about him anyhow. I had to 
comfort her.” 

“That’s because she feels guilty for being so disagreeable,” 
I said; “and she would of course suffer dreadful remorse, 
poor girl, if he were drowned looking after her boat, as I pray 
he won’t be.” 

I began to understand now. Poor Mr. Starr was jealous 
of his friend, the Jonkheer. 

“Well, I wish she’d love me a little, then, as there’s nobody 
else.” 

“Do you know, I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if she does ,” 
I almost whispered. “Perhaps that’s what’s making her so 
queer. ” 

“I wish I could think so,” sighed Mr. Starr. But he didn’t 
look as radiant as one might have expected. He seemed more 
startled that delighted. “Anyhow,” he went on, “you’re a 
dove-hearted angel, and it’s all fixed up that I’m to be a 
brother to you, whatever other relationships I may be en- 
gaged in. I must try and get to work, and earn my salt by 
making you happy. ” 

“I don’t feel to-night as if I could ever be happy again,” 
I told him. “The world seems such a sad place to be in. ” 

“I’ll see what I can do, anyhow,” said he. “Would it make 
you happier if van Buren were happier ?” 


268 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Oh yes,” I exclaimed. “He’s been so kind to Nell and 
me. But I’m afraid nothing can be done. An unfortunate 
marriage for a young man of — of an affectionate nature is 
such a tragedy, isn’t it ?” 

“Awful. But it may never came off.” 

“I don’t see what’s to prevent it,” I said. And the memory 
of that last look on Mr. van Buren’s face came up so vividly 
that tears stood in my eyes. 

“I’ve thought of something that might,” said he; and I 
was burning to know what when the door opened, and Nell 
came in without her coat and hat. 

She eyed Mr. Starr reproachfully. “Oh, you promised to 
ask Robert to go back with you to the pier,” she said. “Has 
he gone by himself ? ” 

“I don’t — ” Mr. Starr had begun guiltily, still sitting 
beside me on the sofa, when her cousin appeared on the 
threshold. He was very pale, and looked so grave that I 
thought some bad news must have come. Nell thought so, 
too, for she took a step toward him as he paused in the open 
doorway 

“You’ve — heard nothing ?” she stammered. 

“Poor Rudolph,” he began; but at the sound of such a 
beginning she put out her hands as if to ward off a ghost, and 
her face was so death-like I was frightened lest she was going 
to faint. Then, suddenly, it changed, and lit up. I never saw 
her so beautiful as she was at that moment. She gave a cry of 
joy, and the next instant our handsome brown skipper had 
pushed pass Mr. van Buren at the door, and had both her 
hands in his. 

He was dripping with water. Even his hair was so wet that 
I saw for the first time it was curly. 

“Oh, I’m so glad, so glad!” faltered Nell. “Robert said 
‘ poor Rudolph ! ’ and I thought ” 

“I was only going to say poor Rudolph had had a bad 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 269 
night of it,” broke in Mr. van Buren; but I don’t think either 
of them heard. 

“Were you anxious about me ? Did you care ?” asked 
Jonkheer Bred erode. 

That seemed to call Nell back to herself. “I was anxious 
about ‘Lorelei,’” she said. “You’ve brought her back all 
right ?” 

“Yes, and ‘Water spin,’ ” he answered, with the joy gone 
out of his voice. “We had rough weather to fight against, but 
we’ve come to no harm.” He turned to me wistfully. “Had 
you a thought to spare for the skipper once or twice to-day. 
Miss Rivers ?” 

I was so grieved for him that, before I knew what I was 
saying, I exclaimed 

“Why, I’ve thought of nothing else!” 

I put out my hand to him, and he shook it as if he never 
meant to let it go. 

“How good you are,” he said warmly. 

And I didn’t dare look at Mr. van Buren, for the idea 
came to me that maybe he would not now believe what I 
had told him a little while ago. 

This morning I scolded Nell before our chaperon for her 
coldness to Jonkheer Brederode, when he had done so much 
for her. 

“How could you,” I asked, “when the poor fellow seemed 
so pleased to think you cared ? It was cruel.” 

“I didn’t want him to think I cared,” Nell answ r ered. 

“Dear girl, you were quite right,” said Lady MacNairne. 
Then she laughed. “He hoped to make our Phil jealous, I sup- 
pose, for his real thought seems to have been for her , doesn’t it ? ” 

Neither of us answered. I quite fancied last night that she 
had been wrong about those surmises others ; but now, when 
she put it in this way, I wasn’t so sure, after all. 


XXIV 


N ELL has been very strange for the last few days, but 
singularly lovable to everybody except Jonkheer 
Brederode; and to him she has never been the same 
for ten consecutive minutes. Perhaps it is a mercy 
if Lady MacNairne is right, and he was never in love with her, 
though it would be sad if he thought of me in that way. I 
should be sorry to have any one as unhappy as I now am. It’s 
a good thing for me that we were traveling, for if we were at 
home I should hardly be able to go through it without letting 
Nell or others suspect the change. As it is, there is always 
something new to keep my thoughts away from myself and 
other people, of whom it may be still more unwise to think. 

Nell avoided Jonkheer Brederode as much as she could 
the morning after the storm. She said that, as he took no 
interest in her, it could not matter what she did so far as he 
was concerned. She was quite meek and subdued when she 
answered any question of his, until they differed about some- 
thing. It was about Urk, a little island she had discovered on 
the map, exactly in the middle of the Zuider Zee. 

When she heard that “ Lorelei- Mascotte’s” motor had been 
injured slightly, and we could not go on, she suggested that 
while we were waiting we might take steamer to the island, 
stop all night, and come back to Enkhuisen next day. By that 
time Hendrik, our chauffeur, would have repaired the damage. 
“Urk isn’t worth seeing,” said our skipper. 

Nell asked if he had ever been there. 

“No,” he replied; but he had heard that it was a dull little 
hole, and it would be far better to stop at Enkhuisen till next 

270 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 271 
morning, when we could get away, if the weather changed, to 
Stavoren. 

“There’s nothing to do in Enkhuisen,” said Nell. 

“No,” said he; “but there’ll be less in Urk. I strongly advise 
you not to go.” 

“That decides it,” said Mr. van Buren, who was stopping 
on for a day or two. 

At once Nell fired up. “Not at all,” said she. “No one who 
doesn’t want to, need go; but those who do, will. All favorably 
inclined hold up their hands.” 

Up went Mr. Starr’s, and Lady MacNairne slowly followed 
his example. Whether it is that she wishes to be with her 
nephew because she’s fond of him, or whether she thinks 
highly of her duties as our chaperon; anyway, she generally 
comes with us if he does. I hated displeasing Mr. van Buren; 
but when Nell said, “Phil, you’ll stick by me, won’t you ?” 
I couldn’t desert her, especially as I feel that, for some reason 
or other, she’s as restless and unhappy as I am. It may be 
the poor dear’s conscience that troubles her; but I sympathize 
with her just the same, for mine is far from clear. I have such 
hard, uncharitable thoughts toward one of my own sex — one 
perhaps not as much older than I am, as she looks. 

I think Mr. van Buren was torn between his desire to stand 
by his friend (who said he must stay to superintend the re- 
pairs) and his natural wish to see his cousin through any 
undertaking, no matter how imprudent. He went on trying to 
dissuade Nell from going to Urk, but the more he talked the 
more determined she grew. She was surprised at our indiffer- 
ence to a wonderful pinhead of earth, which had contrived to 
stick up out of the water and become an island after the great 
inundation that formed the Zuider Zee. Judging from guide- 
books, the population was quite unspoiled, as Urk was too 
remote to be a show place, although the costumes were said 
to be beautiful. Such a spot was romance itself, and it would 


272 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

be almost a crime not to visit it. The steamer would leave 
Enkhuisen after luncheon, returning next day, so we must 
stop on the island for about eighteen hours; but as the guides 
mentioned an inn, it would be as simple as interesting to 
spend a night at the idyllic little place. 

Jonkheer Brederode made no more objections after the 
first, and finally it was settled that all of us should go, except 
our skipper and Mr. van Buren. 

We packed small bags, and took cameras. And we had 
to scramble through luncheon to catch the steamer, which 
was rather a horrid one, apparently being intended more for 
the convenience of enormous bales, sacks, and fruit-baskets 
than that of its passengers, who were stuffed in anyhow among 
the cargo. Lady MacNairne was furious, because it was too 
cold for Tibe on deck, and he wasn’t allowed below in the 
tiny, poky cabin. She argued with the captain, or somebody 
in authority and velvet slippers; but he being particularly 
Dutch, and very old, even her fascination had no power. (It 
is strange, but when Lady MacNairne gets excited she talks 
more like an American than a Scotswoman ; however, I believe 
she has been to the States.) At last we all three formed a kind 
of hollow square round Tibe with our skirts over his back, 
and when he wasn’t asleep he amused himself by pretending 
that our shoes were bones. 

Even Mr. Starr could not keep us gay and laughing for the 
whole two tiours of the trip, for we were squeezed in between 
bags of potatoes (he sat on one), and our feet kept going to 
sleep. But Nell said, think of Urk, and how seeing Urk would 
make up for everything. 

Eventually we did see it, and it really did look pretty from 
a distance, with its little close-clustered red roofs like a button- 
hole bouquet floating on the sea. As the steamer brought us 
nearer the island something of the glamor faded; but there 
were about a dozen girls assembled to watch the arrival of the 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 273 
boat, wearing rather nice, winged white caps and low-necked 
black dresses. 

Quickly we made our cameras ready, expecting them to 
smile shyly and seem pleased, as at Volendam; but with one 
accord they sneered and turned their backs, as if on a word 
of command. We “snapped” nothing but a row of sunburnt 
necks under the caps. The girls laughed scornfully, and when 
we landed they repaid our first interest in them by staring at 
us with impudent contempt. There was no one to carry our 
bags, so we had to do it ourselves, Mr. Starr taking all he could 
manage; and as we trailed off to find the hotel, about forty 
or fifty ugly and disagreeable-looking people followed after 
us, jeering and evidently making the most personal remarks. 

Nobody could, or would, tell us where to find the inn; 
but it was close by really, as we presently found out for our- 
selves, after we had gone the wrong way once or twice. Per- 
haps it wasn’t strange, though, that we missed it, for it was 
a shabby little house with no resemblance to a hotel; and 
when we went in, the landlord, who was cleaning lamps and 
curtain-rods in a scene of great disorder in the principal room, 
showed signs of bewildered surprise at sight of us. Rut he was 
a great deal more surprised when he heard that we wished to 
stay the night. He had not many rooms, he said, and people 
seldom asked for them; indeed, no tourist had ever done so 
before within his experience. Still, he would do his best for 
us, and — yes, we could see the rooms. 

He dropped his cleaning-rags and curtain-rods on the floor, 
and, opening a door, started to go up a ladder which led to a 
square hole in the floor above. We followed, all but Lady 
MacNairne, who would not go because Tibe could not, and 
at the top of the hole were two little boxes of rooms with beds 
in the wall — stuffy, unmade beds, which perhaps the land- 
lord and some members of the family had slept in. 

“This is going to be an adventure,” said Nell; but her voice 


274 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

did not sound very cheerful, and I felt I could have cried when 
I heard that she and I would have to bunk together in the wall, 
in a two-foot wide bed smelling like wet moss. 

We were dying for tea, or even coffee, but it seemed useless 
to ask for it, as apparently there were no servants, and the 
landlord went back to his cleaning the instant we had scram- 
bled down the ladder. 

“Perhaps,” said I, “we can find a cafe , if we go out and 
explore. ” 

So we went, followed by beggars for the first time in 
Holland, and it was a hideous island, with no sign of a cafe or 
anything else nice, or even clean. All was as unlike as possible 
to the ideas we had formed of the dear little Hollow Land. 
There were dead cats, and bad eggs, and old bones lying 
about the oozy gutters, and people shouted disagreeable things 
at us from their doorways. 

Mr. Starr tried to be merry, but it was as difficult, even for 
him, as making jokes in the tumbril on the way to have your 
head cut off, and Lady MacNairne said at last that she would 
much rather have hers cut off than stay seventeen more hours 
in such a ghastly hole. 

“I simply can’t and won’t, and you shan’t, either!” she 
exclaimed. “We’ve been here an hour, and it seems a month. 
Somehow we must get away.” 

Poor Nell was sadly crushed. She admitted that she had 
made a horrible mistake, which she regretted more for our 
sakes than her own, though she herself was so bored that she 
felt a decrepit wreck, a hundred years old. 

“But the steamer doesn’t come back till eight or nine 
to-morrow morning. I’m afraid we’ll have to grin and bear it 
till then,” said Mr. Starr. 

“I can’t grin, and I won’t bear it,” replied Lady Mac- 
Nairne. “Dearest Ronny, you are a man, and we look to you 
to get us away from here. ” 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 275 

Poor Mr. Starr stared wildly out to sea, as if he would call 
a bark of some sort from the vasty deep; but there was 
nothing to be seen except an endless expanse of gray water. 
Nell had torn her dress on a barbed-wire fence which shut us 
away from the only spot of green on the hideous island ; Tibe 
had unfortunately eaten part of what Mr. Starr said was an 
Early Christian egg; I had wrenched my ankle badly on a bit 
of banana peel; Lady MacNairne’s smart coat was spoilt by 
some mud which a small Urkian boy had thrown at her, and 
Mr. Starr must have felt that, if he didn’t instantly perform a 
miracle, he would be blamed by us all for everything. 

“We might get a sailing-boat,” he said, when he had 
thought passionately for a few minutes. 

We snapped at the idea, and a moment later we were on 
our way to the harbor to find out. 

Now was the time that I became a person of importance. 
Owing to my studies, in which Mr. van Buren has encouraged 
me so kindly, I know enough Dutch to ask for most things 
I want, and to understand whether people mean to let me have 
them or not, which seems odd, considering that I deliberately 
made up my mind not to learn a word when Nell almost 
dragged me to Holland. Under Mr. Starr’s guidance, and at 
his dictation, I interviewed every sailor we met lounging about 
the harbor. 

It was very discouraging at first. The men were all sure 
that no sailing-boat could get to Enkhuisen, as the wind was 
exactly in the wrong quarter; but just as our hearts were on 
their way down to the boots Tibe had gnawed so much, a 
brown young man, with crisp black curls and ear-rings, said we 
could go to Kampen if we liked. It would take four or five 
hours, and we should have to sleep there, taking the steamer 
when it started back in the morning. Kampen was beautiful, 
he told us, with old buildings and water-gates; but even if 
it hadn’t been, we were convinced that it must be better than 


276 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Urk, so we joyously engaged a large fishing-boat owned by the 

brown man and his still browner father. 

We made poor Mr. Starr go back alone to the inn and 
break it to the landlord that we were not going to stay, after 
all; but he paid for the rooms, so the old man was delighted 
that he could go on with his cleaning in peace. 

Now we began to be quite happy and excited. Mr. Starr 
brought us bread and cheese from the inn to eat on board, and 
presently we were all packed away in the fishing-boat, which 
smelt interestingly of ropes and tar. 

Nell and I sat on the floor, where we could feel as well as 
hear the knocking of the little waves against the planks which 
alone separated us from the water. 

There was not much breeze to begin with, for the winds 
seemed to be resting after their orgy of yesterday, and just as 
the old bronze statue and the young bronze statue were ready 
to start, the little there was died as if of exhaustion. 

There we sat and waited, our muscles involuntarily strain- 
ing, as if to help the boat along; but the sail flapped idly: we 
might as well have tried to sail on the waxed floor of a ball- 
room with the windows shut. 

“Can’t they do something ?” asked Lady MacNairne, in 
growing despair. 

I passed the question on; but the men shook their heads. 
Without some faint breeze to help them along they could not 
move. 

When half an hour had dragged itself away, and still the 
air was dead, or fast asleep (Mr. Starr said that Urk had stifled 
it), we began to realize the fate to which we were doomed. 
We would either have to spend the night curled up among 
coils of rope, with no shelter except a windowless, furnitureless 
cupboard of four feet by three, which maybe called itself a 
cabin, or we would have to crawl humbly back to the inn and 
sue for a night’s lodging. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 277 

We were hungry and cross, a little tired, and very, very 
hot. It would have been a great relief to burst into tears, or 
be disagreeable to some one. I don’t know why, but I had the 
most homesick longing to see Mr. van Buren. It seemed as 
if, had he come with us, everything would have been right, 
or at least bearable. 

Suddenly, as we were dismally trying to make up our minds 
what to do, and Mr. Starr had proposed to toss a coin, Lady 
MacNairne pointed wildly out to sea, crying 

“Look there — look there !” 

A dot of a thing was tearing over the water — a dot of a 
thing, like our own darling, blessed motor-boat, and the nearer 
it came the more like it was. \t last there was no room for 
doubt. “Lorelei-Mascotte” was speeding to our rescue, across 
the Zuider Zee, all alone, without fat, waddling “Waterspin.” 

I don’t believe, if I’d heard that some one had made me 
a present of the Tower of London, with everything in it, I 
should have been as distracted with joy as I was now, for the 
Tower couldn’t have got us away from Urk, and “Lorelei- 
Mascotte” could. Besides, Mr. van Buren would probably not 
have been in the Tower, whereas intuition told me that he was 
coming to me — that is to us — as fast as “Mascotte’s” motor 
could bring him. 

We stood up, and waved, and shouted. I hardly know what 
other absurd things we may not have done, in our delirium of 
joy. As I said to Mr. van Buren a few minutes later, it was 
exactly like being rescued from a desert island when your food 
had just given out, and you thought savages were going to 
kill you in the night. 

Jonkheer Brederode was almost superhumanly nice, con- 
sidering what he had endured at Nell’s hands, and that it was 
really through her obstinacy that we’d suffered so much, and 
made ourselves and everybody else concerned so much trouble. 
Mr. van Buren said, for his part, he would have tried to 


278 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

persuade his friend to punish Nell by leaving her to her fate, if 
he hadn’t been sorry to have it involve me — and, of course, 
the others. 

When Jonkheer Brederode found that by ferociously hard 
work on his part and Hendrik’s, the damage could be repaired 
sooner than he had expected, he at once proposed following us 
to Urk. He knew what it was like, and how, within a few 
minutes after landing, we would hate it. He was certain that 
we would be in despair at being tied to the wretched island for 
the night, and he had proposed to go teuf-teufing to our suc- 
cor. The lack of wind which had meant ruin to our hopes, was 
a boon to the motor-boat, which had flown along the smooth 
water at her best speed. And when “Mascotte” was received by 
us with acclamations, our noble skipper did not even smile a 
superior smile. 

He only said that, when he found he could, he thought he 
might as well follow, and spin us back, if we liked to go, and 
he hoped Miss Van Buren would pardon the liberty he had 
taken with her boat. 

If she had been horrid to him then, I do believe I should 
have slapped her; but she had the grace to laugh and say that 
“Mascotte” really was a mascot. There is something, I sup- 
pose, in having a sense of humor, in which I’m alleged to be 
deficient. 


XXV 


T HAT was the way it happened that we had two 
nights at Enkhuisen; but the second we spent on 
“Lorelei-Mascotte” and “Waterspin,” sleeping on 
the boats for the first time, and it was great fun. 
The next morning early, we had a picnic breakfast on board, 
making coffee with the grand apparatus in Mr. Starr’s won- 
derful tea-basket, which he had bought at the most expensive 
shop in London, like the extravagant young man he is. We 
didn’t wait to finish before we were off; and then came the 
trip to Stavoren, which Jonkheer Brederode would not have 
let us make on the boat, if the weather had not been calm, for 
once more we had to steer straight across the Zuider Zee for 
several hours. 

When we had arrived it was hard to realize that Stavoren 
had once been a place of vast importance, and that a powerful 
king had lived there in old, old days, for the bastion seemed 
the only thing of importance in the poor little town now. But 
no doubt the great sand-bank, with its famous legend of the 
Proud Lady, is enough to account for the decline. 

Nell smiled in a naughty, mischievous way, when her 
cousin remarked that his mother’s family came originally from 
Friesland, I suppose because Jonkheer Brederode had just 
told us that the Frisian people are the most obstinate and per- 
sistent in the Netherlands : that all the obstinacy in any other 
whole province would not be as much as is contained in one 
Frisian man — or woman. But I think they have reason to be 
proud of themselves, especially as their obstinacy has kept 
their ancient customs and language almost intact, and the 

279 


280 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Spaniards never could make the least impression upon them 
by the most original and terrific kinds of tortures, invented 
especially to subdue Frisians. If they were buried alive, they 
just went on smiling, and saying, “I will,” or “I won’t,” until 
their mouths were covered up. 

I almost wished that Jonkheer Brederode hadn’t said, be- 
fore Mr. van Buren, that a “Frisian head” is an expression 
used by the Dutch when they mean incredible hardness or 
obstinacy; but he didn’t mind at all, and immediately told us 
a thing that happened to his mother and some Frisian cousins 
of hers when they were girls. A musical genius, a young man, 
was visiting at their house, and when he had played a great 
deal for them at their request, he made a bet that they would 
tire of hearing his music before he tired of making it. They 
took the bet, and he began to play again; but he was not 
Frisian, and had never been in Friesland before, therefore he 
was not prepared for what would happen. Still, he was Dutch, 
so he did not like giving up, and he went on playing for twenty- 
four hours, without stopping for more than five minutes at a 
time. The ladies always exclaimed: “Please go on if you can; 
we’re not tired at all, ” though they looked very pale and ill ; so 
he didn’t stop until he tumbled off his music-stool, and had to 
be carried away to bed, where he lay for two days. But the 
Frisian girls suffered no bad consequences, and said, if he had 
not given up, they would have sat listening for at least a week. 

Once Jonkheer Brederode had a big yacht which he lent to 
the Belgian king for a trip, and there was a Frisian skipper. 
Every morning the decks were washed at five o’clock, and the 
king sent word that he would be glad to have it done later in 
the day, as it waked him up, and he could not go to sleep 
again. Then the Frisian answered, “Very sorry, King, but 
we always do wash the decks at five, and it must be done”; 
which amused his majesty so much that he made no more 
objections. 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 281 

If the people of Friesland have great individuality, so have 
their meers. There was a canal through which we had to pass 
after Stavoren, like a long, green-walled corridor leading into a 
huge room. The green wall was made of tall reeds, and we 
had glimpses of level golden spaces, and sails which seemed to 
be skimming through meadows. There was a crying of gulls, 
a smell of salt and of peat, which once formed the great forests 
swallowed up by the meer. Then, through a kind of water- 
gateway, we slipped into our first Frisian meer, where the 
water was like glass, the black sails of yellow sail-boats were 
purple in the sunlight, and the windmills on the distant shore 
looked like restless, gesticulating ghosts. 

Our wash raised a golden, pearl-fringed wave, but the water • 
was so clear that now and then we fancied we could faintly see 
the old road under the meer, which they say Frisian farmers 
use to this day, knowing just where and how to guide their 
horses along it, through the water. 

Because of this road, and others like it, Jonkheer Bred erode 
had taken on a pilot at Stavoren, a man able to keep us off all 
hidden perils. He seemed to know every person on every 
heavily-laden peat-boat, or brightly painted eel-boat, and Nell 
insisted that even the families of wild ducks we met nodded to 
him as we went by. 

We passed from the meer called Morra into the biggest in 
all Friesland, Fluessen Meer; and it was all rather like the 
Norfolk Broads, where my father once took me when I was a 
child. Always going from one meer into another, there were 
charming canals, decorated with pretty little houses in gardens 
of roses and hollyhocks, and emphasized, somehow, by strange 
windmills exactly like large, wise gray owls, or, in the dis- 
tance, resembling monks bearing aloft tall crosses. 

It was exquisite to glide on and on between two worlds; 
the world of realities, the world of reflections. Villages were 
far separated one from another, on canal and meer, though 


282 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

there were many farmhouses, walled round by great trees to 

keep cool the store-lofts in their steeply-sloping roofs. Gulls 

sat about like domestic fowls, and perched on the backs of 

cows, that grazed in meadows fringed with pink and purple 

flowers. 

Men and girls rowed home from milking, and hung their 
green and scarlet milk-pails in rows on the outer walls of their 
farmhouse homes. Fishing-nets were looped from pole to pole 
bv the water-side, in such curious fashion as to look like vine- 
yards of trailing brown vines ; and as we drew near to Sneek, 
where we planned to stay the night, we began to meet quaint 
lighters, with much picturesque family life going on, on board ; 
children playing with queer, homemade toys ; ancient, white- 
capped dames knitting; girls flirting with young men on pass- 
ing peat-boats — men in scarlet jerseys which, repeated in the 
smooth water, looked like running fire under glass. 

The old seventeenth-century water-gate at Sneek was so 
beautiful, that we expected to like the place with the ugly 
name; but after all we hated it, and decided to spend another 
night in our own floating houses. 

All sorts of funny, water-noises waked me early; but then, 
I hadn’t slept very soundly, because I couldn’t help thinking a 
good deal about Mr. van Buren, who found a telegram waiting 
for him at Sneek, and went away from us by the first train he 
could catch. I don’t know what was in the telegram, but he 
looked rather miserable as he read it, and I wondered a good 
deal in the night if his mother had called him back because 
Freule Menela van der Windt was not pleased at having him 
stay so long with us. 

Nell thought our next day’s run, going through the River 
Boorn to the Sneek er Meer, past Grouw and on to Leeu war- 
den, even more delightful than the day before; but it didn’t 
seem as interesting to me, somehow. Perhaps it was having a 
person who was partly Frisian standing by me all the time, and 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 283 
telling me things, which made the difference; anyway, I had a 
homesick feeling, as if something were lacking. Mr. Starr said 
it would be nice to spend a honeymoon on board one of the 
nice little wherries we saw in the big meer; but I thought of 
Mr. van Buren and Freule Menela having theirs on one, and it 
gave me quite a sinking of the heart. I tried not to show that I 
was sad, but I’m afraid Mr. Starr guessed, for in the afternoon 
he gave me a water-color sketch he had made in the morning, 
on deck. He called it a “rough, impressionist thing,” but it is 
really exquisite; the water pale lilac, with silver frills of foam, 
just as it looked in the light when he sat painting; fields of 
cloth-of-gold, starred with wild flowers in the foreground ; far- 
off trees in soft gray and violet, with a gleam of rose here and 
there, which means a house-roof half hidden, in the middle 
distance. Lady MacNairne admired the sketch particularly; 
and I got the idea — I hardly know why — that she was not 
quite pleased to have it given to me instead of to her. 


XXVI 


I T was late afternoon when we came to Leeu warden, and 
the first thing we found out was, that it was not at all 
a place where we should enjoy stopping on the boats, 
because of a very “ancient” and very, very “fish-like 
smell” which pervaded the canal, and made us wear extra- 
ordinary expressions on our faces as it found its way to our 
nostrils. But nobody else seemed even to notice it; nobody 
else wore agonized expressions; indeed, the girls we met as 
we drove to the hotel had dove-like, smiling faces. They 
were tall and radiantly fair, with peace in their eyes; and 
those who still kept to the fashion of wearing gold and silver 
helmet-head-dresses were like noble young Minervas. I could 
have scolded the ones who were silly enough to wear modern 
hats; but all the old ladies were most satisfactory. We didn’t 
meet one who had not been loyal to the helmet of her youth; 
and they were such beautiful old creatures that I could well 
believe the legend Jonkheer Brederode told us : how the sirens 
of the North Sea had wedded Frisian men, and all the girl- 
children had been as magically lovely as their mothers. 

The old-fashioned, rather dull streets were crowded with 
people, who seemed in more of a hurry to get somewhere than 
they need have been, in such a sleepy town; and when we 
arrived at the hotel all was excitement and bustle. It hap- 
pened that we had come in the midst of Kermess week, the 
greatest event of the year at Leeu warden; and if a party of 
Americans had not gone away unexpectedly that morning they 
could not have given us rooms, though Jonkheer Brederode 
had telegraphed from Sneek. 

284 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 28.5 

As soon as we were settled, though it was nearly dinner- 
time, he proposed that we should dart out and have a look 
round the fair, because, he said, ladies must not go at night. 

“Why not ?” asked Nell, quick, as usual, to take him up 
if he seems inclined to be masterful. “I should think it would 
be more amusing at night.” 

“So it is,” he admitted calmly. 

“Then why aren’t we to see it ?” 

“Because the play is too rough. Tom, Dick, and Harry, 
as you say in England, come out after dark, when the fair’s 
lighted up and at its gayest, and it is no place for ladies to be 
hustled about in.” 

“I’ve always found 4 Tom, Dick, and Harry,’ very inoffen- 
sive fellows,” Nell persisted. 

“You’ve never been to a Dutch Kermess.” 

“That’s why I want to go. ” 

“So you shall, before dark.” 

“And after dark, too,” she added, as obstinately as if she 
had been a Frisian. 

“That is impossible,” said Jonkheer Brederode, his mouth 
and chin looking hard and firm. 

Nell didn’t say any more, though she shrugged her shoul- 
ders; but the expression of her eyes was ominous, and I felt 
that she was planning mischief. 

We walked out to the Kermess, which Lady MacNairne 
and Mr. Starr pronounced very like a French country fair; 
but it seemed wonderful to me. There were streets and streets 
of booths, little and big, gorgeously decorated, where people 
in the costumes of their provinces sold every imaginable kind 
of thing. Nell was so well-behaved that she evidently disarmed 
Jonkheer Brederode’s suspicions, if he had shared mine; and 
when she proposed buying a quantity of sweets and cheap 
toys for us to give away to families of children upon the 
lighters we passed on canals, he was ready to humor her. We 


286 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

chose all sorts of toys and sweets — enough to last us for days 
of playing Santa Claus — and bargained in Dutch w T ith the 
people who sold, making them laugh sometimes. Then, Jonk- 
heer Brederode took us to all the best side-shows: the giant 
steer, as big as sixteen every-day oxen; the smallest horse in 
the world, a fairy beast, thoughtfully doing sums in the sand 
with his miniature forepaw; the fat lady, very bored and 
warm; the fair Circassian, who lured audiences into a hot 
theater with tinsel decorations like a Christmas-tree and 
hundreds of colored lights. There were other sights; but 
Jonkheer Brederode said these were the only ones for ladies, 
and hurried us by some of the booths with painted pictures 
of three-headed people or girls cut off at the waist, which Nell 
wished particularly to see. He wouldn’t let us go into the 
merry-go-rounds either, and by the time we got back to the 
hotel — our hands full of dolls, tops, spotted wooden horses, 
boxes of blocks, and packets of nougat surmounted with 
chenille monkeys — she was boiling with pent-up resentment. 

Already we were late for dinner, and we still had to dress; 
but Nell — who shared a room with me, as the hotel was 
crowded — said that she must slip out again, to buy something 
which she wished to select when alone; she would not be gone 
many minutes. 

I was all ready when she ran in again with two large 
bundles in her hands. She would not tell me what they were, 
as she was in a hurry to change (at least, that was her excuse), 
but promised that I should see something interesting if I 
would come up to the room with her after dining; and I was 
not to tell any one that she had been out for the second time. 

We were long over our dinner, as there was such a crowd 
that the waiters grew quite confused ; and, at the end, we three 
women sat with Jonkheer Brederode and Mr. Starr in the 
garden behind the hotel, while the men smoked. Nell was 
so patient that I almost thought she had forgotten the bundles 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 287 
up-stairs. But at last Lady MacNairne, hearing a clock chime 
ten, announced that she had some writing to do before going 
to bed. 

“I suppose you will have a look at the Kermess again ?” 
she said to our two knights. 

“I’ve seen dozens of such fairs; and when you’ve seen 
one, you’ve seen pretty well all, nowadays. But if the Mariner 
would like to go, I shall be glad to go with him,” Jonkheer 
Brederode answered. 

“I’m not sure I didn’t see enough this afternoon,” said 
Mr. Starr. “Anyhow, I mean to have another cigarette or 
two here; and I do think the ladies might stop with me, for 
I have a hundred things to say.” 

Lady MacNairne and Nell were on their feet, however, 
and would not be persuaded; so we bade each other good- 
night, and three minutes later Nell was opening her parcels 
in our room. 

“Among the last letters that were forwarded from London, 
was a larger check than I expected from the Fireside Friend , ” 
said she; “so I’ve bought a present for you, and for me, from 
my affectionate self.” 

With that, she had the paper wrappings off two glittering 
Frisian head-dresses, like beautiful gold skull-caps. And in 
the other bundle were two black shawls, like those I had seen 
several girls of Leeuwarden wearing. 

“Oh, how sweet!” I exclaimed. “Thank you so much. I’ve 
been wanting some kind of costume ever since Amsterdam, 
where they were so expensive. These are to take home and 
keep as souvenirs, when we are at work in our poor little flat, 
just as if nothing had ever happened to us.” 

Nell gave a shudder, but she didn’t say that we never 
would go home and to work again, as she used to say if I 
spoke of it when we were beginning our trip. Instead she 
said 


288 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I don’t know about the future; but I’m going to wear mine 
to-night. ” 

“What, sleep in that helmet ?” I asked. 

She laughed. “I’m not thinking about sleep yet. It’s just 
the edge of the evening — in Kermess week. Watch me. ” 

She undid her hair, which is very long and thick, and 
seems even thicker than it is, if possible, because it is so wavy. 
Then she plaited it tightly into two braids, and straining, and 
pulling, and pushing the little ripples and rings back from her 
face, as well as she could, she managed to put on the helmet. 
Then she tied the shawl over her shoulders; and as she had 
on a short dark skirt which was unnoticeable, she looked, for 
all the world, like a beautiful Frisian girl. 

I told her this, and she said, “Will you be a Frisian girl 
too, and come out with me to see the Kermess at the time 
when it’s worth seeing ?” 

I was dreadfully startled, and of course said “No.” I had 
never done anything in disguise, and I never would. 

“Very well, then,” said Nell, “I’ll go alone.” 

I tried to dissuade her; but she did not object to shocking 
Jonkheer Brederode. 

“It would do him good,” she said. “Only he won’t have 
the chance this time, because no one would ever recognize me, 
would they ?” 

I looked hard at her, and was not quite sure, though the 
pushing back of the hair and the wearing of the helmet did 
change her wonderfully, to say nothing of the shawl. But she 
looked far too beautiful to go out alone in the night. The 
golden head-dress gave her hair the color of copper beech 
leaves, and the gleam of the metal so close to the face made 
her complexion transparent, as if a light were shining through 
a thin sheet of mother-o ’-pearl. 

When I found that she was determined, I told her that I 
would go, rather than she should run the risk alone; but she 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 289 
only laughed, and said there was no risk. Even if our skipper 
were right about foreigners, surely two Frisian girls of the 
lower classes might walk about at the fair, when the best fun 
was going on; we should find plenty of others exactly like our- 
selves. And when I’d tried the helmet on before the mirror, I 
could not resist wishing that Mr. van Buren might have seen 
it — simply to amuse him, of course. 

The next thing was to steal down-stairs without being seen. 
We wrapped our shawls over our heads, helmets and all; but 
we need not have feared, every one was away at some enter- 
tainment or other, and we did not meet a soul. Once outside 
the hotel, we rearranged the shawls, crossing the ends behind 
our waists, and Nell said that it did not matter if we met the 
whole world now. As we should not have to open our mouths 
to any one, and betray our ignorance of Dutch, there would be 
nothing to show that we were not Frisian girls. 

The full moon was just coming up as we left the hotel., but 
when we had turned two or three corners, and reached the 
streets where the Kermess was going on, there was such a 
white blaze of electricity that the moon and her pale light were 
swallowed up. In the dazzling illumination, the booths and 
merry-go-rounds, and carousels, with their sparkling decora- 
tions of tinsel, seemed to drip gold and silver; and the garlands 
and trees and fountains of electric light scintillated like myriads 
of diamonds. 

There had been crowds in the afternoon, but now they 
were five times as dense. The brilliant, open-air cafes were 
crammed, and the band in each one was playing a different 
air. Everybody was laughing, and shouting and singing; 
the people had thrown away their Dutch reserve, and even 
middle-aged men and women were enjoying themselves like 
children. 

I felt self-conscious and guilty at first, but it was such a gay 
scene that nobody could help getting into the spirit of it; and 


290 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

just as Nell had prophesied, there were plenty of Frisian girls 
about, in gold or silver helmets, like ours, only nobody stared 
at them particularly, and everybody did stare at us. 

I remarked this to Nell, and the fact that no shawls of our 
sort were being worn; but she laughed and said that if people 
stared we might as well take it as a compliment; she flattered 
herself that we happened to be looking our best. 

It really was fun. We dared not buy anything on account 
of our foreign accent; but we wandered from street to street, 
jostled by the crowd, stopping in front of the gayest booths, 
and even going into a side-show where a Javanese man was 
having fits to please the audience. Jonkheer Brederode had 
refused to take us in the afternoon, when we had shown an 
interest in the painting which advertised the Javanese creature; 
but, after all, the fits were more exciting on canvas than they 
were inside the hot, crowded tent, and some young soldiers 
stared at us so much that we were glad to get out. 

Next door was the most gorgeous carousel I ever saw. It 
was spinning round under a red plush roof, embroidered with 
gold and sparkling crystals, and festooned with silver chains. 
To the strains of the Dutch national air, life-sized elephants 
with gilded castles, huge giraffes, alarming lions, terrific tigers, 
beautiful swans, and Sedan chairs were whirling madly, with 
great effect of glitter and gaiety. 

“All my life I’ve wanted to ride in a merry-go-round,” said 
Nell, “and I never have. Now’s our one chance. There’s a 
Spanish bull and a Polar bear to let. Come on.” 

She seized my hand, and before I realized what we were 
doing, I was sitting on a large bull, wildly clinging to its horns, 
while Nell, just in front, perched on the back of a sly-looking 
white bear. 

No sooner were we settled than the four young soldiers 
who had stared in the fit-man’s tent, jumped on some other 
animals in the procession, and as we began to fly round the big 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 291 
ring, they called out and waved their hands as if they were 
friends of ours. I was afraid they must have followed us out 
of the tent, and I could understand enough Dutch to know that 
they were saying things about our looks. Every one in the 
crowd laughed and encouraged them, and several people 
standing by to watch, spoke to Nell and me as we whirled. 

It was an awful situation. What with the embarrassment, 
the shame, the horrid consciousness of being part of the show, 
and the giddiness that came over me with the motion, it was 
all I could do to keep from crying. But if I had sobbed while 
spinning round the ring on the back of a bull, I should have 
been a more conspicuous figure than ever, so I controlled my- 
self with all my might. Oh, if only I could have got down, to 
run away and hide ! but there we both had to sit till time for 
the merry-go-round to stop, and I would have given all that’s 
left of the two hundred pounds Captain Noble willed me, to 
make the horrid machinery break down. 

As we sailed round and round my agonized eyes caught the 
surprised gaze of a man I knew. For an instant I could not re- 
member how, or where, or how much I knew him ; but suddenly 
it all came back. I recognized Sir Alexander MacNairne, whose 
acquaintance we made in Amsterdam, through Tibe, and the 
worst thing was that, from the expression of his face, I was 
almost sure he recognized us both, in spite of our disguise. 

By this time, the sitting on the bull, and the continued 
whirling at the mercy of a thousand eyes, began to seem a 
torture such as might have been inflicted by the Inquisition if 
you had argued with them about some little thing. I’m sure, 
if any one had sprung forward at this moment to tell me 
that if I would become a Dissenter of any kind, or belong 
to the Salvation Army, I needn’t be a martyr any longer, but 
should be saved at once, I would have screamed “Yes — yes 
— yes!” 

At last the animals did slow down, and Nell and I slid off 


292 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

our monsters before they had stopped ; but instead of improv- 
ing our situation, we had made it worse. 

While we had been sailing round the ring, no one could 
approach disagreeably near. The minute we tried to mingle 
with the crowd and disappear in it, however, the impudent 
young soldiers mingled too, having the evident intention of 
disappearing with us. 

The things that happened next, happened so quickly, one 
after the other, that they are still confused in my memory. At 
the time I knew only that the soldiers were following and 
surrounding Nell and me; that my heart was beating fast, that 
her cheeks were scarlet and her eyes very large and bright, 
either with fear or anger, or both; that I felt an arm go round 
my waist, and a man’s rather beery breath close to my ear; 
that I cried “Oh !” that rude girls were laughing; and then that 
Nell was boxing a man’s ears. I am not even quite sure that 
everything was in this exact order! but just as I heard that 
sound of “smack — smack,” I saw Sir Alexander MacNairne 
not far off, and without stopping to remember that we were 
supposed to be Frisian peasant girls, I called to him. I think 
I said, “Oh, Sir Alexander MacNairne, come — please come !” 

With that, he began to knock people about, and break a 
path through to get to us; and some of them laughed, and 
some were angry. Even in those few seconds I could see that 
he was a hot-tempered man, and that the laughs made him 
furious. He said things in English, with just the faintest 
Scotch “burr”; and as there were no Dutchmen of Mr. van 
Buren’s type in the rude crowd, the Scotsman had soon tum- 
bled the men about like ninepins — all except the soldiers — 
and got close to us. 

But the soldiers were not to be thrown off so easily, even 
by such a big man as Sir Alexander MacNairne, and Nell and 
I would have been in all the horrors of a fight — a fight on our 
account, too — if Jonklieer Brederode had not appeared in the 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 293 
midst, as suddenly and unexpectedly as if he had dropped 
from the round, full moon. 

He must have come from behind me, and my mouth was 
open to exclaim how thankful I was to see him, when he has- 
tily whispered, just loud enough for Nell and me to hear, 
“Don’t seem to know me.” Then he began talking authori- 
tatively in Dutch to the young soldiers, looking so stern and 
formidable that it was no wonder the fun died out of their 
faces (they were mere boys, all four), and they shrank away 
from Nell and me as if we had been hot coals which had burnt 
them when they touched us. 

When Jonkheer Brederode first dashed to our rescue, Sir 
Alexander MacNairne had been extremely busy with two of 
the little soldiers, but overawed by their countryman’s dis- 
tinguished manner and severe words, they lost their desire to 
fight and sheepishly joined their companions. This gave Sir 
Alexander a chance to see to whom he owed the diversion, 
and to my surprise he exclaimed, “Rudolph Brederode !” 

He did not speak the name as if he were pleased, but 
uttered it quite fiercely. His good-looking face grew red, and 
his blue eyes sparkled with anger. I was astonished, for 
neither Nell nor I had any idea that they knew each other; 
and I was still more startled, and horrified as well, to see Sir 
Alexander make a spring toward Jonkheer Brederode, as if 
he meant to strike him. 

Our skipper stood perfectly still, looking at him, though 
Sir Alexander’s arm was raised as if in menace; but at that 
instant the lifted hand was seized, and the arm was moved up 
and down rapidly, as if it were a stiff pump-handle that needed 
oiling. 

It was Mr. Starr who had seized it, and began to shake it 
so furiously. Before the tall Scotsman had time to understand 
what was happening, Mr. Starr had wheeled him round so 
that his back was turned toward us, and I heard the nice 


294 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

American voice exclaiming, “How do you do ? Never had such 

a surprise. Where’s your wife ?” 

“Where’s my wife ? That’s what I mean to ask Brede — ” 
Sir Alexander had begun, struggling to get his hand out of 
Mr. Starr’s cordial clasp. But before I could hear the end of 
the word, much less the first syllable of another, Jonkheer 
Brederode was hustling Nell and me, out of sight of the others, 
round the carousel. 

“Come with me, and get out of this, quickly,” he said, but 
not in a scolding tone, such as I had dreaded when he dis- 
covered us in such a shocking situation brought on by out own 
folly. 

I was dying to ask questions, but of course I did not dare; 
and though I was afraid at first that Nell would resist, she was 
as meek as a sugar lamb. 

The motive seemed very mysterious, but I couldn’t help 
fancying it was on Sir Alexander MacNairne’s account that 
Jonkheer Brederode had wished us not to recognize him; 
still I could not think why. When we had talked about Sir 
Alexander MacNairne the other day at Amsterdam, the Jonk- 
heer said nothing about their acquaintance. I wondered if 
there had been a quarrel, and if so, what it could have been 
about, though it was certainly no affair of mine. Still, it is 
hard to control one’s thoughts; and I wondered more and 
more as Jonkheer Brederode hurried Nell and me back to the 
hotel, not by the short way we had taken before, but dodging 
about through a dozen intricate streets as if he were anxious to 
give trouble to any one who might be following. Our skipper 
seemed preoccupied, too, which was a good thing for us, as it 
took his mind off our crimes. As it was, he actually made no 
allusion to our strange costume, our escapade, or even the 
hateful adventure from which he had rescued us — for that 
he had rescued us there was no question. Sir Alexander Mac- 
Nairne, with his quick temper, and his ignorance of the 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 295 
Dutch character as well as the Dutch language, and the priv- 
ileges of Ivermess week, was making matters worse for us, 
instead of better, when Jonklieer Brederode dashed in and 
saved the situation. What would have happened if he hadn’t 
come, I dared not think, for there would certainly have been 
a fight, and Nell and I might presently have found ourselves, 
with Sir Alexander MacNairne, in the hands of the police. 

The skipper might easily have enlarged on this, and pointed 
a moral lesson, but not a word did he say about anything that 
had happened. Maybe, this humiliated us even more than if 
he had scolded, for his silence was very marked, and he ap- 
peared to take not the slightest interest in either of us, except 
to get us indoors, where we cfould do no further mischief. 
His manner was cold ; and whether this arose from his strange 
preoccupation, or from annoyance with us, I couldn’t decide. 
In either case, I was thankful when we were in our room, and 
had taken off our shawls and the beautiful helmets which now 
I detested. 

But we had not had time to undress, when there was a 
knock at the door. Nell opened it, and there stood Lady 
MacNairne, in a dressing-gown, with a veil wrapped over her 
head — perhaps to hide curling-pins. I thought that Jonkheer 
Brederode must have roused her up to report our crimes, and 
sent her to show us the error of our ways, though to do such a 
thing was unlike him. But her first words proved that I had 
misjudged our poor skipper. 

“Girls,” she said, “could you be ready to leave the hotel 
and go on board * Lorelei ’ — good gracious, I mean ‘ Mas- 
cotte’ ! — in a quarter of an hour ?” 

I almost thought she must be talking in her sleep. 

“Why, Lady MacNairne!” I exclaimed, “it’s half-past 
eleven.” 

“I know,” said she. “All the more reason for haste. I’m 
not joking. There’s a reason why we ought to be off at once. Of 


296 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

course, ‘Mascotte’ is your boat, dear Nell, and it’s your trip. 
But you and Phyllis are so kind to me always, that I’m sure 
you’ll consent without asking for more explanations, won’t 
you, when I say that it’s for my sake, and to save a lot of 
bother.” 

When Lady MacNairne wants anybody to do anything for 
her, she makes herself perfectly irresistible. I don’t know at 
all how, but I only wish I had the art of doing it. Sometimes 
she is domineering — if it’s a man to be managed — or even 
cross; sometimes she is soft as a dove; but whichever it is, 
you feel as if streams of magnetic fluid poured out of the tips 
of her fingers all over you, and your one anxiety is to do what 
she wants you to do, as quickly as possible. 

It was like that with Nell and me, now. We said, both to- 
gether, that we wouldn’t be ten minutes, and we weren’t. 
But in spite of the wild speed with which we flung together 
the few things we had unpacked, and in spite of the fact that 
we were dressed, except for our hats, while Lady MacNairne 
was in her wrapper, she was ready before us. 

We were to meet in her room, and just as we arrived, 
dressing-bags in hand — for it was not a time of night to ring 
for porters — Mr. Starr appeared round a turn of the corridor. 
He didn’t see us at first, but began to say something to his 
aunt about a “narrow shave,” when he caught sight of Nell 
and me inside the open door. 

I was on the point of asking him what had become of Sir 
Alexander MacNairne, with whom we had left him violently 
shaking hands, when I remembered that Lady MacNairne 
had said he was a “relation of hers by marriage,” so I thought, 
since there was evidently trouble of some sort between him 
and Jonkheer Brederode, I had better not bring up the sub- 
ject in her presence. Whatever might be the mysterious reason 
which was taking us away like thieves in the night, Mr. Starr 
had the air of knowing it — as he naturally would, since Lady 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW £C7 
MacNairne was his aunt; but no matter which of the other 
two men was to blame, I was sure he was innocent. He was 
as nice and helpful, too, about carrying down all our things, as 
if it were his interest instead of the others’, to get us out of the 
hotel and on to the boat, although he is such a lazy, erratic 
young man, that he must have been quite upset by the sur- 
prise and confusion. 

Jonkheer Brederode had been down-stairs, paying our bills 
and settling up with the landlady, who seemed to be the only 
person not at the Kermess. As we all walked toward him, to 
show that we were ready to start, I caught a few words which 
the landlady was saying. I am not yet sure of getting things 
right in Dutch, but it did sound as if she said in reply to some 
question or order of his, “Rely on me. No such impertinent 
demand shall be answered.” 

A stuffy cab, which might have been fifty years old, had, it 
seemed, been called by Mr. Starr, who was as sympathetic as 
usual in the dilemmas of others. We squeezed in, anyhow, 
except Jonkheer Brederode, who sat on the box to tell the 
driver how to go, his cap pulled over his eyes, as if it were 
pouring with rain, instead of being the most brilliant moon- 
light night; and Tibe sat on all our laps at once. 

Hendrik and Toon sleep on “Mascotte” and “Waterspin,” 
and they were on board, true to duty, though if they had been 
anything but Dutchmen, they would probably have sneaked 
slyly off to the Kermess. They are not the sort of persons who 
show surprise at anything (Nell says that if the motor burst 
under Hendrik’s nose, he would simply rub it with a piece of 
cotton waste — his nose or the motor, it would not much 
matter which — and go on with what he had been doing 
before) ; so no time was lost, and in ten minutes we were off, 
finding our way by the clear moonlight, as easily as if it had 
been day. 

We had not gone far, when I spied another motor-boat. 


298 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

larger than ours, but not so smart, in harbor, and I stared 
with all my eyes, trying to make out her name, for she had not 
been there when we came in; but “Mascotte” flew by like* a 
bird — much faster than she ever goes by day, in the water- 
traffic, and I could not see it. 

Everything was much too exciting for us to wish to sleep, 
though had we stopped quietly in the hotel, we should have 
been in bed before this. Jonkheer Brederode advised us to go 
below, as the air was chilly on the water, and such a wind had 
come up that it blew away two cushions from our deck-chairs. 
But we would not be persuaded. 

Out of the narrow canal we slid, into a wide expanse of 
water, cold as liquid steel under the moon, and tossed into 
little sharp-edged waves which sent “Mascotte” rolling from 
side to side, so choppily that I was glad to get into the next 
canal, even narrower than the first, such a mere slip of water 
that cows on shore, vague, shadowy, shapes, puffed clouds of 
clover-sweet breath in our faces as we leaned toward them 
from the deck. 

The windows of little thatched cottages seemed to look 
straight into our cabin windows, like curiously glinting, wake- 
ful eyes; and Jonkheer Brederode said that, by daylight when 
the canal was crowded with barges and lighters, it needed al- 
most as much skill and patience to steer through it, as to guide 
a motor-car through Piccadilly in the height of the season. 

It took bribery and corruption, I’m afraid, to get the sluice 
gates opened for us in the middle of the night; and Jonkheer 
Brederode had his Club flag flying, in case any one proved 
obstinate. But no one did, so perhaps — as people are sup- 
posed to be quite the opposite of their real selves in disposition, 
if waked suddenly — Frisians are weak and yielding if roused 
in the night. 

It was wonderful to see the moonlight fading into dawn, 
over the canal, and the gentle, indistinct landscape, and I 


PHYLLIS RIVERS’ POINT OF VIEW 299 
wished that Mr. van Buren could have been with us, as I am 
sure it was the kind of thing which would have appealed to his 
heart — especially if Freule Menela were not with him, to 
hold him down to earth. 

Morning was clear in the sky when we came to Groningen, 
and we were not in the least tired, though we had not even 
tried to doze. At a nice hotel, called by the odd name of the 
“Seven Provinces," where Jonkheer Brederode had arranged 
for us to stop a night if our plans had not been suddenly 
changed, there was a telegram for Nell. It was from Mr. van 
Buren, and said, “Can I bring fiancee and sisters to spend a 
day with you at Utrecht ? Answer, Robert van B., Scheven- 
ingen.” 

Of course, one word costs less than two, and is therefore 
wiser to use in a telegram. Besides, she is his fiancee. But it 
looked so irrevocable, staring up from the paper, that I felt 
more sorry for him than ever. I was a little excited, too, as 
Nell was wiring back “Yes, delighted,” and adding the date on 
which we expected to arrive at Utrecht. I am excited still, as 
I write this; for I have the idea that Freule Menela was angry 
with Mr. van Buren for spending so much time with us, and 
that she wants to punish him — or somebody else. 










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RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 


XXVII 

I SHOULD think few men ever loved more passionately, 
yet picturesquely, than I loved those two beautiful step- 
sisters when for their sakes I started out upon a crimi- 
nal, motor- boating career. 

To have their society, to gaze daily upon their lovely faces, 
to hear their charming voices, and to find out which girl I 
really loved more than the other, I willingly stole an aunt and 
then lied about her so often, that eventually I almost began to 
believe she was my aunt. Perhaps — I said to myself, when 
any barking dogs escaped from the kennel of my conscience to 
be soothed — perhaps she had been my aunt in another state 
of existence. But then, I would have said anything about her, 
to myself or others, by way of furthering the cause; and the 
game was well worth the candle — for the first part of the trip. 

Alb being frankly and openly a worshiper of the adorable 
Nell Van Buren, my own countrywoman, I saw that, out of all 
the girls I ever loved, including her stepsister, she was the 
only one it would be impossible for me to live without. 

That state of mind lasted up to the night when we arrived 
at the deadest of all Dead Cities of the Zuider Zee, Enkhuisen. 
There it broke upon me out of a clear sky that my Burne- 
Jones angel, Phyllis Rivers, loved and was loved by, another; 
that other, a graven image of a Viking, who could never ap- 
preciate her as she deserved. 

Until the blow fell, I had always, half unconsciously, felt 
that she was there; that if I lost the incomparable Nell, the 

301 


302 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

exquisite Phyllis was on the spot to console me; and she is at 
her best as a consoler. But suddenly, at a moment when I was 
soaked with rain, snubbed by Nell, as well as foolishly con- 
cerned about the fate of that white man’s burden, my Alba- 
tross, and altogether ill-fitted to bear further misfortunes, I 
learnt that Phyllis regarded me as a brother. 

I hid my chagrin in sympathy for hers, but Phyllis in tears 
proved distracting. She is the one girl I have ever seen who 
can cry without a deplorable redness of the nose. Tears rolled 
like pearls over her lower lashes, which are almost as long as 
the fringe of the upper lids, and I wondered how I could ever 
have thought another girl more desirable. Too late for my 
comfort did she assure me that, in her opinion, my case was 
not hopeless with her stepsister. It was Phyllis, not Nell, 
whom I now wished to snatch from the arms of a hated rival 
(not that she was in them yet, but she might be at any minute 
unless I secured her) and it was painful that at such a crisis 
she should throw her once unattainable stepsister at my head. 

Next day, to be sure, when Alb brought the motor-boat to 
our rescue at Urk, the way Nell’s big hazel eyes lit up at sight 
of him, set my heart vibrating again like a pendulum, and I 
found myself much in the same condition I had been in at 
first; unable to decide which, after all, was the more indis- 
pensable of the two girls. But this return to chaos did not 
make for peace of mind, because, though I could not bear to 
lose either, I should be lucky if I contrived to keep one. Be- 
sides, there was the worry about Sir Alec MacNairne, and 
the danger that he might pounce down upon us to destroy the 
fabric I had so carefully woven. 

Altogether, the features of Friesland were not cut with the 
same cameo-clearness upon my perception that other parts of 
Holland had taken a few weeks or even days ago, when I was 
young and happy. 

As I remarked early in our black partnership, even an 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 303 
Albatross can have its uses. Perhaps, if the truth were known, 
the Ancient Mariner occasionally fell down and would have 
broken a bone if the Albatross, tied round his neck, had not 
acted as a kind of cushion for his protection. At Amsterdam, 
in a moment of peril for our plot, Alb acted somewhat in this 
capacity for me, showing himself to be possessed of all that 
shrewd adroitness which should furnish the equipment of 
every well-regulated villain. At Leeuwarden, therefore, it was 
for me to do something desperate when desperate need arose. 

I shall never cease to applaud my own presence of mind in 
the matter of turning the enemy’s flank. My wrists were lame 
for days after that famous handshake with Aunt Fay’s hus- 
band which, in his surprise, spun the big fellow round like a 
teetotum, and gave Alb a chance to vanish with the girls. 

If Aunt Fay had indeed been on board “Lorelei,” re-named 
“Mascotte”; if the “M.,” late “L.,” had been Brederode’s boat, 
and he had really been flirting with my aunt through the water- 
ways of Holland, according to Sir Alec’s wild impression, I 
couldn’t have been more anxious to save her from his jealous 
wrath by giving him the slip. 

Alb had never spoken of a flirtation, and though, at the 
time it was first sprung upon me by Sir Alec, I was angry with 
the Albatross for his close-mouthedness, my inconvenient 
sense of justice forced me to admit afterwards that it wasn’t 
exactly the kind of thing he could have confided to me of all 
others. 

When that peppery Scotsman opened his heart, and poured 
forth the true story of Aunt Fay’s mysterious disappearance 
from the scene, for a minute or two any feather floating in my 
direction could have knocked me down; but I hung on to my 
captive uncle all the same, while I rearranged my ideas of the 
universe at large, and my corner of it in particular. 

I told him it was nonsense to be jealous of Aunt Fay. Of 
course such a pretty, jolly woman as she, full of life and fun as 


304 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

a girl, was bound to be popular with men, and to flirt with 
them a little. There was nothing in that to make a fuss about, 
said I. As for Brederode (whom I had to admit knowing, since 
we must have been seen together) I assured Sir Alec that, if he 
could hear Rudolph talk in a friendly way about my aunt, he 
wouldn’t have the slightest uneasiness. Finally I made the 
fiery fellow confess that Aunt Fay’s last little flirtation — the 
most innocent in the world, like all her “affairs” — was not 
with Brederode but with an Englishman, an officer in some 
crack regiment. Sir Alec did not deny that he had scolded 
his wife. He said that she had “answered him back,” that 
there had been “words” on both sides, that she had stamped 
her foot and thrown a bunch of roses at him — middle-aged, 
wet-footed roses snatched from a vase which happened to be 
handy. That he had called her a minx; that she had retorted 
with “beast”; that he had stalked out of the room and then out 
of the house, slamming doors as hard as he could ; that when 
he returned, not exactly to apologize, but to make up at any 
price, it was to find her gone, with her maid and several boxes, 
leaving no address; that he had tracked her to London, and 
eventually — as he believed — to Paris ; that while there he 
had seen a newspaper paragraph announcing that Lady Mac- 
Nairne was traveling through Dutch waterways on a motor- 
boat belonging to Jonkheer Brederode; that he had taken 
train for Amsterdam, where he had presently discovered that 
“Lorelei” had been; that he had visited all hotels, hoping to 
find the names of the party in the visitors’ book, but had not 
been able to discover them (luckily we hadn’t put our names 
down, and on leaving Alb had tactfully hinted to the manager 
that no inquiries concerning us were to be answered); that 
since then all trace of “Lorelei ” had been lost. 

I replied that it was probably a mistake made by some 
journalist, and that Lady MacNairne had never been on 
board Brederode’s boat. I was going on to say more things. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 305 
when Sir Alec exclaimed, “Why, you ought to know where 
the boat is, and who’s on board her. You and Brederode 
were together to-night, and ” 

“We hadn’t been together for ten minutes,” I vowed; and 
kept to the strict letter of the truth, for I had been smoking 
alone in the garden when Brederode came back and proposed 
that after all we should have a stroll round the fair. It hadn’t 
taken us ten minutes to get there from the hotel. 

“I didn’t ask Brederode any questions about himself after 
meeting him,” I went on; and that also was strictly true. 
“But,” I hurriedly added, seeing a loophole of escape, “I 
can look him up, if you like, and, without mentioning your 
name, find out whether Aunt Fay is, or ever has been, with 
his party, which I doubt. Don’t you think, for the sake of 
her name and yours, that would be better than for you to seek 
him out and make a row, before you’re sure whether there’s 
anything to row about ?” 

Sir Alec reflected for a minute, which was evidently an 
effort, then answered that perhaps I was right. But supposing 
I missed Brederode, whose haste to slip away went far to 
prove his guilt ? 

I would not miss him, said I. And his disappearance proved 
nothing. There were those pretty Frisian girls that he — Sir 
Alec — had been protecting when Rudolph and I came along. 
Brederode had probably escorted them home, not seeing any 
reason why he should interrupt our conversation. 

My innocent surprise on hearing that, despite their cos- 
tumes, the girls were not Frisian girls, but English or Ameri- 
can ladies he had met in Amsterdam, convinced Sir Alec 
that they were strangers to me. And finally the scene ended 
by my promising to find Brederode, who was certainly — I 
said — stopping in the town, whether or no he had brought 
a motor-boat to Leeuwarden. I was to question Brederode in 
a diplomatic manner, and then to report to Sir Alec, on a 


306 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

motor-launch he had hired in Amsterdam, as the best means 
of tracking down the craft for which he sought. This boat, 
“Wilhelmina,” was now in the canal at Leeuwarden, but, for 
reasons intimately concerning that canal, he had taken a room 
for the night at a hotel recommended by his chauffeur. 

Fortunate it was for us that the chauffeur did not happen 
to prefer our hotel; and almost equally fortunate that Sir Alec 
was not spending much time on board his hired vessel, for, 
were he lurking there, it would be difficult to slip past without 
being followed. He had perhaps seen “Mascotte” on entering 
the canal (as it appeared that he had come in only toward 
evening), but he had not suspected the innocent-looking little 
creature, with her fat chaperon, “Water spin,” of having an 
alias. If, however, a motor-boat attempted to glide past his in 
the night, he would give chase, and see us on board “Mascotte. ” 
For this reason I was delighted to hear that he was at a 
hotel for the night, and I advised him to go there at once, to 
await my coming. 

“How long shall you be ?” he asked impatiently. 

I assured him that all I had to do might keep me an hour; 
but I saved a few tattered rags of conscience by evading a 
verbal promise to call on him at the end of that hour. So much 
he took for granted; and, as the things I really had to do were 
to get the whole party on to “Mascotte” and out of the capital 
of Friesland, I left my uncle-in-law without much ceremony. 

Nothing could have been neater than the way we gave him 
the slip, flying by his deserted motor-boat without a qualm, 
and, I hoped, beyond his reach at the same time. 

Never, during the whole course of the trip, had I been as 
glad to arrive at a place as I was to arrive at Groningen. 

We ought, according to the program of our itinerary mapped 
out by Alb, to have reached the big town in the afternoon in- 
stead of morning, and to have spent the time till evening in 
seeing sights. But all was changed now. Luckily Alb (who is 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 307 
an uncomfortable stickler for truth at all costs) could consci- 
entiously inform the girls that Groningen’s principal attrac- 
tions might be seen in a couple of hours. 

We tore round the place in the fastest cab to be got, I having 
bribed the driver not to spare his horse; yet it was at Alb 
the girls looked reproachfully, when they were allowed but 
three minutes in the largest market-place of Holland, five for 
St. Martin’s Church and the organ praised by diplomatic 
Erasmus, two to search vainly for diamond-gleaming glass 
tiles on houses which Amici admired forty years ago; and 
another grudging two for a gallop through the Noorden Planta- 
tion, of which the rich town is proud. There must be some- 
thing about my appearance which convinces people that, 
whatever evil is afoot, I, at least, am innocent. I have noticed 
this since boyhood, the phenomenon being most conspicuous 
when I was least deserving; whereas, with Alb, it is the other 
way round. His darkly handsome face, with its severely clear- 
cut features, his black hair and brows, his somber eyes, are 
the legitimate qualifications of the stage villain. Even the well- 
known cigarette is seldom lacking; therefore, if I wished for 
revenge, I have often had it. When I am to blame for any- 
thing, Alb is sure to be suspected. 

Indeed, any one might have thought, from the impatient 
fire in his eyes, as he steered “Lorelei” (alias “Mascotte”) 
through the canal after leaving Groningen, that his was the 
secret need for haste, his the guilty desire to escape. 

As for me, I hid my rage at the legal mandate which here 
compelled us to “go no faster than a man can walk.” Under 
an air of blithe insouciance I disguised my fears, never starting 
perceptibly at “any toot” behind us which might mean Sir 
Alec on our track, and appearing to enjoy with the free spirit 
of a boy, the one great amusement of the day. 

This consisted in surprising and making happy many 
families of children on board the lighters we passed, by 


308 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

bestowing upon them toys and strange sugary cakes bought 
at Leeuwarden Kermess. Not all the lighters had children, 
but those that had, owned dozens, and all the ugly ones had 
whooping-cough . 

If I had been given my way, only the pretty children and 
those who did not whoop should have got presents; but the 
extraordinary lady who plays the part of aunt to me, and 
chaperon to the Angels, said that the uglier you are, the more 
gifts you need. Perhaps it is on this principle she has demand- 
ed so many from me. But — is she ugly ? I hardly know. She 
has one of those strange little faces which do not seem to ex- 
press the soul behind them — a face whose features I can’t 
see when I shut my eyes. I should like, by the way, to know 
what hers are like, behind her big blue spectacles; but she 
says they are not strong, so possibly the blue glass is a merci- 
ful dispensation. 

Her mildest hints, as well as her commands, are invariably 
acted upon, and though she seldom insists, she magnetizes. 
Accordingly, the ugliest children got the best things; but as 
there were more pretty than ugly ones, the toys lasted all the 
way along the somewhat monotonous canal to Assen, a little 
town half lost in its own forests. 

It took us till evening to get there, and as we were to sleep 
on the boats, rather than risk the hotel, I proposed to Alb 
that we should start again early the next morning, before 
the ladies waked. “There can’t be much to see at Assen,” 
said I, “and if, after he’d been given the slip, my peppery 
Scotch uncle tumbled to the idea of 4 Lorelei ’ and 4 Mas- 
cotte ’ being one ” 

“That would be reason enough for stopping at Assen,” 
said Bred erode. “There are things to see there, very good 
and unique things; but ordinary tourists don’t often hear 
about them, and if Sir Alec MacNairne is chasing us, he’ll 
glide by Assen without a thought.” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 309 

This put a different face on the matter, and I was able to 
smile calmly when Alb whetted the Angels’ appetite by de- 
scribing the treasures concealed among the groves surround- 
ing Assen. They were not exactly at Assen, it seemed, but 
Assen was the starting-point, and from there you set forth 
in carriages to Rolde, for the purpose of gazing upon Hunne- 
betten. 

What these might be, when you found them, I had not an 
idea, though pride forbade me to inquire of Alb, especially 
before the girls. But pride never forbids Aunt Fay’s little 
counterfeit presentment (perhaps it will save time if in the 
future I allude to her as the L.C.P.) to ask any question. 
She is never satisfied with guide-books, but demands and 
absorbs information about every place we visit, scribbling 
down notes in the book she wears on her chatelaine. (There 
must have been dozens of “refills” fitted in between the silver 
covers since we started, though what she wants of the stuff 
she collects, I can’t imagine.) She did not hesitate to exclaim, 
“What on earth are Hunnebetten ?” And there was no igno- 
miny in listening, with a bored air of having been born knowing 
these things, while Alb described the objects as supposed 
graves of Huns, built of glacier-borne stones. 

Next morning we drove out to worship at these ancient 
shrines, winding along a charming, wooded road, through 
avenues of young oaks, balsamic pine forests, and acres of 
purple heather, to say nothing of a certain pink flower which 
must be heather’s Dutch cousin. 

Some of the Hunnebetten were hidden in the woods, others 
rose gloomily out of the sweet simplicity of a hayfield, but 
each contrived to give the effect of a miniature Stonehenge, 
and had there been only one monument instead of three, it 
would have been worth the trouble we took to see it. Besides, 
our expedition was rewarded in another way. When we re- 
turned to the boats after breakfasting at a caje in the woods, 


310 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

it was to hear that a motor-launch, patriotically bearing the 
name of “Wilhelmina,” had gone by, faster than the legal 
limit, as if in haste to reach Meppel. According to Hendrik 
and Toon, a tall gentleman had sprung up from the deck-chair 
rushed to the rail, and stared hard at “Mascotte”; but “Wil- 
helmina” had not slowed down. 

On hearing this news, I was inclined to make an excuse 
for lingering at Assen; but Alb was of opinion that it would 
be as safe, and far less dull, to go on. “Wilhelmina” was well 
ahead; and in any case we did not mean to stop the night at 
Meppel. If we saw Sir Alec’s launch there, we could easily 
slip past, all passengers in the cabin and Hendrik at the helm; 
whereas, if we did not see her, she would not be able to see us. 

We were in the province of Drenthe now, and it looked as 
little Dutch as might be. Even the canal had the air of dis- 
guising itself as the Long Water as Hampton Court, instead 
of being content to seem what it was : and after we had passed 
a few dignified mansions and farmhouses, we came to a region 
of squalid cottages with sullen-faced, short-haired women, and 
children 3hy as wild creatures of the wood, staring at us from 
low-browed doorways. It was not until we were far on our 
eight hours’ journey to Meppel, that we slipped once more 
into a characteristic region of peace and plenty; marching 
lines of dark trees, with foregrounds of pink and azure flowers, 
or golden grain; mossy, thatched roofs, and red tiles crusted 
with golden lichen. But fortunately for the disposal of our 
toy supply, renewed at Assen, the watery way was starred 
with red, green, and blue barges inhabited by large families of 
violet-eyed, tow-headed infants. If by chance we encountered 
a childless barge, we glared resentment at the grown-ups. 
What were they thinking of, not to have babies, these people ? 

The meadow-ringed world of water and sky was all charm 
and grace and quaintness again, at Meppel and beyond, and 
I was in a mood to appreciate its beauty there, for we had a 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 311 
glimpse of “Wilhelmina” in harbor, and apparently deserted. 
Passing within distant sight of her as she lay in harbor, 
Brederode gaily put on speed; for we had got beyond the 
“legal limit” obstructions of the Drenthe canal, into the 
freedom of the Ober Issel, a wide glitter of water, noble as 
the Frisian meers we had left. 

Never was there an evening more exquisite than this, as 
we floated on through the sunset, with the old town of Zwolle 
for our night goal. 

We were in the Swarzermeer, said Brederode; but there 
was nothing black about it, except the name. Sky and water 
had all the rich colors of an opal, and so clear were they, so 
alike in tints and brightness, that we seemed to hang in the 
midst of a rainbow bubble. 

Yellow water-lilies lay on a surface of glass, like scattered 
gold, and the tall, thin grasses were gold-green wires in the 
level light of the sun. Each village we passed was a picture 
far beyond my art to paint; and hayricks under their thatches 
or piles of corn stacked in rows close to the water’s edge, shone 
like a spray of fireworks as the darkening sky above slowly 
turned to a bank of hyacinths. Passing sails were gold at first, 
then brown, then pansy-purple, piercing the water with their 
sharp and deep reflections. The shore-line was crowded thick 
with pink and violet flower-spears, as if — said Nell — ranks 
of fairy soldiers had turned out in our honor for a review. . 

She and Phyllis stood near me, drinking in the delicious 
water-smell that mingled with the faint fragrance of closing 
lilies, and watching the sun as, beaten into copper, it sent a 
sudden stream of flame across the glittering crystal. I tried to 
feel alone with them, in a wonderful world which was for us 
three and nobody else except a few swans, and tiny water- 
creatures rustling among the reeds. But there was Alb at the 
wheel, looking handsomer and more inscrutable than I could 
ever look, if I practised for hours on end before a flattering 


312 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

mirror. How could I help spoiling everything by wondering 
if Nell Van Buren were thinking about him while she talked 
with me fitfully, dreamily ? And how could I help asking 
myself whether the image of the Viking did not come blunder- 
ing between Phyllis’s violet eyes and mine, when she seemed 
to look sweetly at me ? 

But it was the sort of evening when one thoroughly enjoys 
being restless and unhappy, and I reveled in my pain. 

Little yellow birds, yellow as the lilies which made a blazing 
line of gold between green reeds and amethyst water, flitted 
fearlessly about the boat, until at last the sun went down 
like a ruby necklace falling into a crystal box. Then we moved 
through mysterious masses of purple shadow, with here and 
there a diamond-gleam, or the wing of a swan like the moon 
rising. And then our own little lights dipped trailing golden 
tassels under the surface of the water. 

“Let us anchor,” said Nell, at last, “and put out our lights 
again, and watch the moon rise. Oh, let us stay here all night, 
and wake early — early, to see the dawn come !” 

I loved her for thinking of it, and so, I fear, did Alb. We 
dined on such picnic things as we happened to have on board, 
and when a pale light, like the reflection of pearls in a mirror, 
began to tremble in the east, out went the lights. The moon 
rose, and Phyllis let me hold her hand, which would have 
made me happy if I hadn’t been almost sure she was feeling 
sisterly. And afterwards I dreamed about both girls. They 
wefe both in love with me, and, after all, I was in love with 
some one else whose name I did not seem to know, of whose 
face I could call up no memory. 

It was Alb who waked me by pounding on the door of my 
cabin on “Waterspin,” and shouting 

“Get up, if you want to see the sunrise.” 

So I bounded out of bed, wishing I could recall that dream- 
face, just to make sure whether or no it was more beautiful 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 313 
than either of the girls’. And by the time I had dressed, and 
gone across to “Mascotte’s” deck, the two I loved were on 
deck also, with the first light of dawn shining in their eyes. 

What did it matter that we had engaged rooms at Zwolle, 
' which we had not occupied ? We breakfasted there instead, 
and saw a beautiful water-gate, together with a few other good 
and very ancient things, about which Alb seemed to know a 
great deal. 

There were no signs of “Wilhelmina,” and my heart felt 
light as we went through a great lock into the Geldern Yssel, 
which would bear us to Holland’s most beautiful province, 
Gelderland. 


XXVIII 


M Y luck was out in Gelderland. 

We had a good day, teuf-teufing to pretty little 
Dieren, big white clouds swimming with us in sky 
and under water, where they moved like shining 
fish down in the blue depths. Butterflies chased us, white, 
scarlet, and gold, whirling through the air as flower-petals 
blow in a high wind; and my thoughts flitted as they flitted, 
for I was too drunk with that elixir, joy of life, to care, as the 
others seemed to care, that Sir Philip Sidney died at the battle 
of Zutphen; that the River Geldern Yssel was cut thirteen 
years b.c. to connect the Rhine with something else; that by- 
and-by we were going to see Het Loo, the Queen’s favorite 
place; or indeed anything else that could possibly be improv- 
ing to the mind. I cared only that Nell and Phyllis were more 
beautiful than ever, and that I still might have a chance — 
with one of them. 

“Let Alb score a little,” I thought, “by his knowledge of 
history and Royalties past and present. Vll paint each of the 
girls a picture, and they’ll forget that he exists.” 

But I did not yet know my Alb and his resources. I had 
forgotten that Gelderland is his special “pitch,” the province 
he annexed at birth. Fate, however, did not forget. 

We got to Appeldoorn that first night; and the palace of 
Het Loo is close to Appeldoorn, so we drove out and slept at 
a hotel near the palace gates. Here it was that the worm turn- 
ed. In other words, Alb became a persona grata , while I re- 
mained an ordinary tourist. 

Alb had influence in high quarters. He got up early, and 
314 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 315 
went off mysteriously to exert it, returning in triumph as the 
rest of us, including Tibe, were breakfasting on the broad 
veranda of the hotel in the woods. Anybody could go into 
the palace-grounds, but he had got permission to take his 
friends into the palace itself. 

The girls were delighted at this, and so was the L.C.P., 
who flew off so quickly to get a “refill” for her note-book, that 
Tibe nearly upset an old peasant with a broad hat and silver 
ear-rings, who was eating and drinking of the best, at a table 
near ours. 

All this feminine enthusiasm over Alb’s idea piqued me 
just enough to keep me from joining the party. I volunteered 
for dog duty while the others saw the palace, and by special 
favor, Tibe (in leash) wandered reluctantly with me through 
the fragrant, green alleys of Het Loo. With me he saw shining 
lakes, and crossed miniature bridges guarded by mild stone 
lions, at which he smelled curiously; with me he sadly visited 
the Queen’s bathing-place, and the pretty little dairy and 
farm, reminiscent of poor Marie Antoinette’s beloved Trian- 
on; and when we were joined by his mistress and the others 
he was ungrateful enough to pretend that I had not amused 
him. 

Alb was in the ascendant, and the gilt had not had time to 
wear off the gingerbread before we arrived at Arnhem. We 
got there in a day from Appeldoorn, by going back over our 
own tracks as far as Dieren, where the beautiful little canal 
seemed to welcome us again, as if we were old friends. Through 
the thick reeds on either side we made a royal progress, a 
wave of water swiftly marching ahead to give them news of 
our approach, so that, as we came toward them, the nearest 
might bow before us, bending their graceful green heads 
down, down, under the water, and staying there until we had 
passed on. 

It was like a journey through a long water-garden. 


316 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

exquisitely designed in some nobleman’s park, until a thunder- 
storm rolled up to darken the landscape, and send Phyllis for 
protection to her “brother’s” side. I should certainly have 
asked her, there and then, to forget the Viking, if a tree near 
by had not been struck by lightning at that instant, and Nell, 
in her sudden pallor and stricken silence, had not been more 
beautiful than I had seen her yet. 

I did not remember until we had been settled for a night 
and part of a day at a hotel with a view and a garden, that 
Alb was more at home in Gelderland than elsewhere in Hol- 
land. But he was treated with marked respect at the Bellevue, 
and people took off their hats to him in the street with ir- 
ritating deference. We went about a good deal in the town, 
seeing historic inns and other show things (the best of which 
was a room once occupied by Philip the Second’s Duke of 
Alva), therefore I had many opportunities of increasing my 
respect for Alb as a personage of importance, if I had been in- 
clined to profit by them; and on top of this arrived his auto- 
mobile from some unknown lair. There were some famous 
drives to be taken in the neighborhood of Arnhem, he ex- 
plained in that quiet way of his, and he had thought it would 
be pleasant to take them in his car. 

We started out in it on the second morning, and hardly had 
we left the big pleasure-town with its parks and villas, when 
we plunged into forests as deep, as majestic, as those round 
Haarlem and The Hague; forests tunneled with long green 
avenues of silver-trunked beeches, where the light was the 
green light which mermaids know. Here and there rose the 
fine gateways and distant towers of some great estate, and 
Brederode told us that Gelderland was famous for its old fam- 
ilies and houses, as well as for the only hills in Holland. 

“Fifty or sixty years ago,” said he, “the nobility of Gelder- 
land was so proud that no one who wasn’t noble was allowed 
to buy an estate and settle here. ” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 317 

“Allowed !” exclaimed Nell. “How could they be prevented 
if they had money and an estate was for sale ?” 

Brederode smiled. “There were ways, ” he answered. “Once 
a rich banker of Amsterdam thought he would like to retire 
and have a fine house in aristocratic Gelderland. He bought 
a place, and wished to build a house to please his fancy; 
but no architect would make his plans, nobody would sell him 
bricks or building material of any kind, and he could get no 
workmen. Every one stood in too great awe of the powerful 
nobles. So you see, boycotting isn’t confined to Ireland — or 
America. ” 

“What happened in the end ?” asked Nell. “I do hope the 
man didn’t give in.” 

“Dutchmen don’t, even to each other,” said Alb. “The 
banker was as obstinate as his enemies. He went to enormous 
expense, got everything outside boycot limits, put up tem- 
porary buildings on his place for workmen from Rotterdam, 
fed them and himself from Rotterdam, and so in the end his 
house was built. But things are different in Gelderland now. 
People who were rich then are poor, and glad of any one’s 
money. Arnhem is as cosmopolitan as The Hague, though it 
has the same curious Indian-Dutch set you find there, keeping 
quite to itself. A good many of the famous old places have 
been sold in these days to the nouveaux riches , but some are 
left unspoiled, and I’m going to show you one of them.” 

With that he drove his car through a wide, open gateway, 
a lodge-keeper saluting as we went by. 

“Oh, but how do you know we may go in ?” asked Phyllis. 

“I’m sure we may, ” said Brederode. 

“Are strangers allowed ?” the L.C.P. questioned him. 

“Harmless ones, like us.” 

Far away a house was in sight, a beautiful old house, built 
of mellowed red brick, its great tower and several minor 
turrets mirrored in a lily-carpeted lake which surrounded it 


318 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

on two sides, like an exaggerated moat. “Fifteenth century,” 
said Bred erode. “But the big tower dates from twelve hundred 
and fifty. ” 

We all stared in respectful awe of age and majesty, as Alb 
stopped the car at a small iron gate about two hundred yards 
from the house. The gate, guarded by giant oaks, led through 
a strip of shadowy park to a glorious labyrinth of rose-gardens, 
and gardens entirely given up to lilies of every imaginable 
variety, while beyond these was a water-garden copied from 
that of the Generalife, which I saw last year at Granada. Nor 
was this all of Spanish fashion which had been imitated. Pedro 
the Cruel’s fountain-perforated walks in the Alcazaar of Se- 
ville had been copied too, and were put in operation for our 
amusement by a gardener with whom Brederode had a short 
confab. When we passed again through the rose and lily gar- 
dens, which were in a valley or dimple between two gentle 
hills, all three of the ladies were presented with as many 
flowers as they could carry, and Alb informed them that they 
would find more, of other varieties, waiting for them in the car. 

“What a divine place!” exclaimed Nell, as we came once 
more to the little gate whence we had the double picture of 
the house and its reflection in the lake. “I don’t see how there 
could be any lovelier one, even in England. How I should 
like to live in that wonderful old house ! I’d have my own room 
and a boudoir in the thirteenth-century tower.” 

“Would you care to go in ?” Alb asked, looking more at 
Phyllis than at Nell. 

Nell flushed and left ‘Phyllis to answer. “It would be quite 
like a fairy tale; but of course we can’t, as the people of the 
house are evidently occupying it.” 

“All the better,” said Brederode. “The lady of the house 
will receive us and give us tea.” 

“No, no !” cried Nell. “It would be horried to intrude upon 
her.” 


RONALD LESTER STARR'S POINT OF VIEW 319 

“You’ll find she won’t consider it an intrusion,” Alb insisted. 
“In fact, I called yesterday and said I was bringing you out 
to-day, so it is an invitation.” 

The hall was stone paved, with glorious oak walls and a 
wonderful ceiling. There were a few Persian rugs, which must 
have been almost priceless, a quantity of fine old portraits, and 
two or three curious suits of armor. Beyond was a Chinese 
room, done in the perfect taste of a nation which loves and 
understands Oriental treasures; and then we came into a 
white-and-gold paneled boudoir, sparsely but exquisitely fur- 
nished with inlaid satinwood which I would wager to be gen- 
uine Sheraton. 

In this room sat a woman who rose to welcome us, a wo- 
man worthy of her surroundings. Her dress was nothing more 
elaborate than black-and-white muslin, but with the piled 
silver of her hair, her arched, dark brows and cameo features, 
her great eyes and her noble figure, she looked a princess. 

“Ah, Rudolph,”. she exclaimed, in the English of an Eng- 
lishwoman born and bred, “how glad I am that you could 
come, and bring the friends of whom you have written me 
so often.” 

“My mother,” Brederode said; and introduced us. 

I am not ashamed to confess that I was tongue-tied. What 
had he written ? How much had he told ? In what way had he 
described — some of us ? 

Nell, who usually has some original little thought to put 
into words, apparently had no thoughts at all; or they lay too 
deep for utterance. The L.C.P. was taciturn too, which was 
prudent on her part, as this exquisite lady had probably heard 
her son speak of his Scotch friend Lady MacNairne. Had 
she ever met Aunt Fay, I knew that Alb was too wise, if not 
too loyal, to have brought us into her power; still I did not 
feel safe enough to be comfortable. And even if I had been 
personally at ease, I should have been too busy with my own 


320 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

thoughts to do credit to myself or country in conversation. 
As I sipped caravan tea from a flower-like cup of old Dresden, 
I wondered what were Nell’s sensations on beholding the 
home and mother of the despised skipper whom it had been 
her delight to snub and tease. 

Evidently he is adored, and looked up to as the one perfect 
being, by his mother, who would hardly have smiled as 
graciously on the beautiful Miss Van Buren, could some imp 
have whispered in her ear how that young lady treated her 
host, when he was nobody but a poor skipper on board a 
motor-boat. Through some careless word which gave a turn 
to the conversation, I discovered that Liliendaal is not the 
only house reigned over by Jonkheer Brederode, alias Alb. 
There’s one at The Hague, but they “find Liliendaal pleasant 
in summer.” 

Indeed, it appears to me that “pleasant” is only a mild 
and modest word for the place; yet its owner can cheerfully 
desert it, week after week, to rub along as a mere despised 
Albatross on board a tuppenny ha’penny motor-boat, running 
about the canals of Holland. 

Of course, he is in love, which covers a multitude of hard- 
ships. But it isn’t as clear as it used to be, which Angel he is 
in love with. Perhaps the latest snubbing was the last drop in 
his cup, which caused the whole to overflow, and he had to 
fill it up again — for another. He poured scorn upon me, in 
our first passage of arms, for being in love with two girls at 
once; but how much more poetical and at the same time more 
generous to love two at a time than not to love one well enough 
to know your own mind ! 

In any case, it was Phyllis who shone on the occasion of 
our call at Liliendaal, and it was she who seemed to make 
the impression upon the gracious mother. Whether it was 
the fact that she is English, or whether it was because she 
could talk to her hostess — as if she knew them — about 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 321 
various distinguished titled beings whom the lady of Lilien- 
daal had not seen for a long time; or whether it was because 
Phyllis once had a cousin who wrote a book about the Earls of 
Helvelyn (the lady’s father was an Earl of Helvelyn) at all 
events the honors were for Phyllis; and if Alb really had 
changed his mind about the two girls, as the L.C.P. is con- 
tinually saying, he ought to have been pleased. 

Phyllis and my alleged aunt were both particularly gracious 
to him on the way back to Arnhem, as if he had risen in their 
esteem now that they realized what an important man he is; 
but afterwards when I accused the L.C.P. of this piece of snob- 
bishness, she vowed that it was only because they both realized 
how much he was giving up for the sake of — somebody. 

Just because I could not be sure which one the somebody 
was, and whether he were more likely to prevail, after this 
coup d'etat, I was uneasy in my mind, with the new knowledge 
of Alb’s greatness. What are my dollars to his beautiful old 
houses, and a mother who is the daughter of an English earl ? 
I suppose these things count with girls, even such adorable 
girls as Nell Van Buren and Phyllis Rivers. 

A thing that happened the same evening has not relieved 
my anxiety. 

At the Hotel Bellevue, each room on the floor w r here we 
live, has its own slip of balcony, separated from the next 
by a partition. I was sitting on mine, after we had all said 
good- night to each other, smoking a cigarette and waiting 
for the moon to rise, an act which she selfishly postpones at 
this time of the month, so as to give her admirers as much 
trouble and as little sleep as possible. 

Suddenly I heard Phyllis’s voice on the other side of the 
balcony partition. 

“Dearest,” she was saying dreamily, “isn’t it strange how, 
on a night like this, you seem to see things clearly, which 
have been dark before ?” 


322 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“It isn’t so very strange,” Nell answered practically. “The 
moon’s coming up. And that’s a sign we ought to be going 
to bed.” 

“I didn’t mean that,” said Phyllis. “I mean, there’s a kind 
of influence on such a beautiful night, which makes you see 
into your own heart. ” 

“What do you see ?” asked Nell. 

I wanted to know what, as much as Nell did, and a great 
deal more, judging from her tone. But unfortunately I had 
no right to try and find out, so I got up, and scraped my chair 
and prepared to go indoors. But I had forgotten to shut my 
match-box when I lighted a cigarette a few minutes before, 
and now I knocked it off the table where it had been lying, 
scattering over the floor every match I had left in the world. 

If they intended to say anything really private, I had made 
noise enough to prevent them from doing it; so I thought 
I might conscientiously remain and pick up some of the 
matches. The personnel of the hotel had gone to its beds, 
therefore, if I wanted to smoke later, it must be these matches 
or none. 

“After all, I’m not quite sure what I do see, when I come 
to ask myself, like that, in so many words,” said Phyllis. “I 
do wish you’d advise me. Will you, dear ?” 

“Of course, if I can,” came the answer, a little shortly. 

“Well, supposing you cared more than you thought you 
ought, for a man it couldn’t be right to care for at all, because 
he belonged to some one else, what would you do ?” 

“Try to stop caring for him,” said Nell. 

“That’s what I think, too; only it might be hard, mightn’t 
it ? Do you suppose it would be easier if a girl did her best 
to learn to love another man, who was free to care for her, and 
did seem to care for her, so as to take her mind off the — the 
forbidden man ?” 

No answer. (I realized that they could not have heard the 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 323 
falling match-box, and I was at my window-door now, going 
in. But the door is a Dutch door, which means that it is 
cleaned and varnished every day; and the varnish stuck.) 

“You might tell me what you think, Nell. You have had 
so much experience, in serials.” 

“Oh !” exclaimed Nell. “I — I hate you, Phil !” 

Their door evidently did not stick, for suddenly it slammed, 
and I guessed that Nell had rushed in and banged it shut 
behind her. 

Now, it is the next day but one after this episode, and we 
are at Utrecht, after having visited an old “kastel” or two 
more in the neighborhood of Arnhem, and then following the 
Rhine where it winds among fields like a wide, twisted ribbon 
of silver worked into a fabric of green brocade. Its high waves, 
roughened by huge side- wheel steamers, spilt us into the Lek; 
and so, past queer little ferries and a great crowded lock or 
two, where Alb used his Club flag, we came straight to the 
fine old city of which one hears and knows more, somehow, 
than of any other in Holland. 

I planned to do a little painting here; but, after all, I don’t 
seem to take as much interest in composing pictures as in 
trying to puzzle out the meanings of several things. 

I suppose a man never can hope to understand women; 
but even a woman sometimes fails to understand another 
woman. For instance, goaded by unsatisfied curiosity to know, 
not only my own fate, but everybody else’s fate, all round, I 
was tempted to take advantage of nephewhood, and put the 
case, as I saw it, to the L.C.P. 

I ventured to tell her what I overheard between the girls on 
their balcony. 

“Now, you must know,” I said, “that I’m in love with 
Phyllis.” 

“I thought it was Nell,” said she. 


324 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“So did I, for a while; but I’ve discovered that it’s Phyllis. 
And I shall be very much obliged to you if you can tell me 
something. In fact, if you can , your dear nephew Ronny will 
present his aunt with a diamond ring. ” 

“You mean if I tell you what you want to hear.” 

“No. It must be what you honestly think.” 

“I don’t want a diamond ring,” said she, which surprised 
me extremely. It was the first time anything worth having has 
been mentioned which she did not want, and, usually, ask for. 

“A pearl one, then,” I suggested in my astonishment. 

“I don’t want a pearl one — or any other one, so you can 
save yourself the trouble of working through a long list,” 
replied the lady who is engaged to be my obliging relative. 
“But go on, and ask what you were going to ask. Anything 
I can do for you, as an aunt, I will. I am paid for it.” 

This grew “curioser and curioser,” as Alice had occasion 
to remark in her adventures. But having embarked upon my 
narrative, I went on 

“Whom do you think Phyllis meant when she spoke of 
trying to learn to love a man who seemed to love her ? Was 
it Alb, or ” 

“Mr. Robert van Buren, perhaps you were going to say,” 
cut in the L.C.P. 

“No, I don’t mean him,” I answered hurriedly. “Modesty 
forbids me to mention the name in my mind. ” 

“But it was given to you by your sponsors in baptism. 
Will it make you very unhappy if I say I don’t think that was 
the name in her mind ?” 

“I shall have to bear it,” I said. “But, of course, I shall 
be unhappy.” 

“We all seem to be unhappy lately,” remarked the L.C.P. 

“Except you.” 

“Yes, except me, of course,” she responded. “Why should 
I be unhappy ? Tibe loves me.” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 325 

“You don’t deserve it; but so do we all,” said I. 

She brightened. 

“You are harmful, but necessary,” I went on. “We are 
used to you. We have even acquired a taste for you, I don’t 
know why, or how. But you have an uncanny, unauntlike 
fascination of your own, which we all feel. At times it is even 
akin to pain.” 

“Oh well, the pain will soon be over,” said she. “We’re 
at Utrecht now. Soon we’ll be going to Zeeland, from Zeeland 
back to Rotterdam; and that’s the end of the trip — and my 
engagement. It will be ‘good-by’ then.” 

“I feel now as if it would be good-by to everything,” I 
sighed. “I never nursed a fond gazelle ” 

“You tried to nurse two,” said she. “You’re like the dog 
who dropped the substance for the shadow. ” 

“Which is which, please ? — though to specify would 
perhaps be ungallant to both. Besides, I haven’t dropped 
either of them. If Phyllis is lost to me, I may still be able 
to fall back on Nell, whom nobody else seems to claim at 
present.” 

“Oh, don’t they ?” murmured the L.C.P. 

“Do they?” 

“She may have left dozens of adorers at home, to pick up 
again when she goes back. She’s a beautiful girl,” said her 
chaperon. 

“Radiantly so, and I used to think also possessed of a 
beautiful disposition. But since she flew out at poor little 
Phyllis, who was asking for advice and comfort, and cried, 
‘ I hate you, Phil — ’ Now, you’re a woman. What had Phyllis 
said to put her in a rage ?” 

The L.C.P. laughed. “Enough to put a saint in a rage,” said 
she. “And Nell isn’t a saint. But they’ve been more devoted 
to each other than ever, since, so she must have repented and 
apologized, and been forgiven, before the moon went down. 


326 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Oh, you poor puzzled creature ! I wouldn’t be a man for any- 
thing !” 

And that was all the satisfaction I could get from her. I 
remain as much in the dark as ever. But Robert van Buren, 
his sisters, and his fiancee are arriving immediately, and per- 
haps I may get enlightenment during the visit. I ought to have 
some reward, since it is through me that the Viking is coming 
with the females of his kind, at this particular time. 

In a moment of quixotic generosity at Enkhuisen, I pro- 
mised Phyllis, as a newly adopted, if reluctant, brother, that 
I would make everything right for her. Afterwards, I was 
inclined to repent of the plan which had sprung, Minerva-like 
full-grown and helmeted, from my suffering brain. But it was 
too late then. I had to keep my word, for I was sure that, 
deep down in her mind, Phyllis was expecting me to perform 
some miracle. 

Rather than disappoint her — and lower my self-esteem — 
I had a talk with Robert the day he was leaving. Not an 
intimate talk, for we aren’t on those terms; but I managed to 
get out of him that he was parting from us before he had 
intended because of a letter from the fiancee. 

“Young ladies are a little exacting when they are engaged, 
I suppose,” said the poor fellow. “They feel they have more 
right than others to a man’s society.” 

Then it was that I asked why he didn’t bring Freule Menela, 
chaperoned by the twins, to Utrecht instead of waiting until 
we had got as far as Zeeland, which the fiancee might think 
too long a journey with such an object in view. He said that 
he would ask her. 

“Don’t seem too anxious,” said I, airily. “And don’t tell 
her you want her to be better acquainted with your cousin and 
step-cousin. Just remark that it will be a jolly excursion, eh ? 
And you might add that Brederode and I — particularly I — 
are awfully keen on seeing her.” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 327 

“Very well, I will give that message,” said he. And I think 
he probably did give it, or something like it; for Nell had a 
telegram from him, while we were still doddering about in 
Friesland, asking if he might bring the ladies on a visit to 
Utrecht. 

Now, it is “up to me” to carry out that plan made on the 
impulse of an unselfish moment. 

Moral : do not have unselfish moments. 


XXIX 


I BELIEVE that, in the dark ages, I was rather a good 
little boy. I used often to tell the truth, and the whole 
truth, even when most inconvenient to my pastors and 
masters. I gave pennies to the poor, unless I very 
much wanted them myself; I said “Now — I — Lay — Me,” 
every night, and also in the morning till advised that it was 
inappropriate; and I sang in a boy’s choir, so beautifully and 
with such a soulful expression in my eyes, that people used to 
pat my curls, and fear that I was destined to die young. 

In those days, or even until a few weeks ago no one who 
looked at me would have believed me capable of plotting 
against young and innocent girls, annexing aunts on the hire 
system, or deluding uncles-in-law with misleading statements. 
Yet these things I have done, and worse; for I have kept my 
word to Phyllis Rivers. 

If I must commit a crime, my artistic sense bids me do it 
well; and then, of course, when one has started in a certain 
direction, one is often carried along a little farther than one 
intended to go at first. 

That was what happened to me, in the affair of Robert 
van Buren and his fiancee. 

I was pledged to Phyllis and myself to free the Viking 
somehow — anyhow. It was rash of me to give this pledge, 
also it was quixotic; and many hours did not pass after mak- 
ing it, before I was seized with regret, and convictions that 
I had been an ass. 

Exactly how I was going to do the deed did not occur to 
me at the time, but I had an idea which fitted in with my 

328 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 329 
other villainies so well, that it seemed really a pity not to add 
it to the richly colored pattern. 

It was for this reason that I dreaded returning to the Hotel 
du Pays Bas from a walk about Utrecht, knowing as I did 
that the van Buren party would have arrived. • 

I stayed out, sketching, as long as there was any light, and 
got a few good bits of the old town; a shadowed glimpse of 
one of Utrecht’s strange canals, unique in Holland, with its 
double streets, one above the other; an impression of the 
Cathedral spire, seen beyond a series of arched bridges; a 
couple of fishermen bringing up a primitive net, fastened on 
four branches, and sparkling as it came out of the water, like 
a spider-web spun of crystal. 

I was careful not to appear till dinner-time; but one is 
obliged in self-defense to dine early in Holland, because what 
seems early to a foreigner seems late to a Dutchman. At 
seven o’clock I went to the L.C.P.’s sitting-room (it has 
become a regular thing for her to have a sitting-room), and 
behold, they were all assembled. 

Nell was plainly dressed in the simplest kind of a white 
frock, but Phyllis had made quite a toilet. Poor child ! I 
could guess why. She need not, however, have given herself 
the pains. The fiancee, compared with her, was like a withered 
lemon beside a delicately ripening peach. 

The van Buren twins are delicious creatures; but they did 
not count in the little drama. Besides, they are, in any case, 
too young for drama. They are just beginning to rehearse 
for the first act of life; and I think for them it will be a pretty 
pastoral, never drama or tragedy, or even lively comedy. 

I knew from Phyllis’s description what sort of girl the 
fiancee would turn out to be, except that I didn’t expect to 
find her quite so smart. Her dress, and the hat she had put 
on for the hotel dinner, might have come from the Rue de la 
Paix; which was all the more credit to her, as I have heard a 


330 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

dozen times if I have heard it once, that she is very poor — as 

poor as she is proud. 

Now was my time to set the ball rolling; and valiantly I 
gave it the first kick. I feigned to be much taken at first sight 
with the young* lady from The Hague. At once I flung myself 
into conversation with her, in which we were both so deeply 
absorbed, that when the L.C.P. suggested going down to 
dinner, nobody can have been surprised when I said, “Please, 
all whom it may concern, I want to sit next to Freule Menela 
van der Windt at the dinner table.” Indeed, most of the party 
have long passed the stage of being surprised at anything I do; 
a state of mind to which I have carefully trained them. The 
Viking, however, has not often seen me at my best, so he star- 
ed at this audacity, but on second thoughts decided not to be 
displeased. 

Neither was the fiancee displeased. I did not attribute her 
pleasure to the power of my manly charms; but the young 
lady is the sort of young lady to be complimented by almost 
any marked attention from any man, especially when other 
girls, prettier than herself, are present. 

I continued to absorb myself in Freule Menela. 

She has, I soon discovered, a veneering of intelligence, 
and a smattering of information on a number of subjects 
useful in a drawing-room. We talked about Dutch art, and 
French art, and so many facts was the maiden able to launch 
at my head, that the lovely pink-and- white twins gazed at 
their future sister-in-law with ingenuous admiration. 

Evidently she had gleaned from Robert all he had to tell 
about me, as well as about the other members of the party, for 
she is not the sort of girl to lay herself out for strangers unless 
she considers them worth while. 

Apparently she did consider me worth while; and during 
dinner she had hardly a word for the Viking, who sat on her 
other side; but that was all the better for him, because it gave 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 331 
him a chance to talk across the table to Phyllis, and to look at 
her when he was sitting dumb. 

“There’s going to be an illumination this evening,” said 
Brederode. “You know the parks and gardens you admired 
so much last night, as we came through the canal into Utrecht ? 
Well, there will be colored lights there; and a walk along 
the towing-path would be rather nice, if any one feels inclined 
for it.” 

“Oh, do let’s go!” exclaimed Phyllis; and the twins echoed 
her enthusiastically. 

That was enough for Brederode, though neither Nell nor 
the L.C.P. replied; and I asked myself by whose side he was 
planning to walk. Had he proposed the excursion with an 
eye to monopolizing the English or the American Angel ? 

I stifled the pang which I could not help feeling at the 
thought that he should have either, and in a low voice asked 
Freule Menela van der Windt if I might be her cavalier, in 
order to continue our very interesting argument ? I had al- 
ready forgotten what the last one was about; but that was a 
detail. 

Had she been a little less well-bred, I think she would have 
bridled. As it was, she really did smirk a little, in a ladylike 
way. 

We took cabs, and drove out past all that was commercial, 
to the place where the towing-path began to be prettiest, and 
the illuminations the most fantastic. 

I was in a cab with the fiancee and her prospective sisters- 
in-law; but when we got out to walk, I self-sacrificingly flung 
the twins to the Chaperon, and, alone with the young lady 
from The Hague (she never lets you forget for five minutes to- 
gether that she is from The Hague) I slackened my pace and 
regulated hers to it, that we might drop behind the others. 

The towing-path and the canal were beautiful and fantastic 
as some night picture of Venice. A faint mist had risen out of 


332 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

the water at sunset, and the red, green, and gold lamps sus- 
pended from trees and barges seemed to hang in it like jewels 
caught in a veil of gauze. The trees arched over us tenderly, 
bending as if to listen to words of love. The soft rose-radiance 
that hovered in the air made lovely faces irresistible, and plain 
ones tolerable. Any normal man would have been impelled to 
propose to the nearest pretty girl, whether he had been pre- 
viously in love with her or not, and the nearest pretty girl 
would have said “yes — yes,” without stopping to think about 
her feelings to-morrow. 

Freule Menela van der Windt is not pretty; but without her 
pince-nez , she looked almost piquant in the pink lights and 
blue shadows which laced our features as we passed, for which 
I was devoutly thankful, as it made my task comparatively 
easy. I found her softer, more feminine, more sympathetic, 
than she had been in the hotel. She would, she said, like to see 
America; and that gave me my chance. It was a pity, I told 
her, that such an intelligent and broad-minded young lady 
should not travel about the world before settling down in such 
a small, though charming, country as Holland. 

Instantly she caught me up, with a little laugh. “Why 
should you take it for granted that I am going to ‘settle down ’ 
anywhere ?” 

“Oh,” said I, rather embarrassed at this direct attack, “I 
— er — was told that Mr. van Buren had been lucky enough 
to persuade you to live in Rotterdam.” 

“Never!” exclaimed Freule Menela, deeply interested in 
this conversation about herself. “I will never live in Rot- 
terdam!” 

“But,” I ventured, with an air of eagerness, “if you should 
marry a man whose interests are in Rotterdam ” 

“It isn’t at all decided that I shall marry such a man,” she 
answered sharply. 

“Not decided ?” I repeated anxiously. “Look here, you 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 333 
know, I don’t think it’s fair to other men that it should be 
taken for granted you’re engaged, if you’re not really. ” 

"Why should it matter to other men ?” asked the lady. 

“Oh, well, it might, you see. There might — er — be some 
man who met you for the first time after he’d heard of your 
engagement, and who for his own peace of mind didn’t dare 
let himself admire your brilliant talents as much as he would 
like to.” 

Now, I had got as far as I intended to go. Some dim idea 
of rescuing the Viking from the girl he doesn’t love, to give 
him to the girl he does (and I do), had been floating in my 
mind ever since that stormy night at Enkhuisen. I had thought 
that Freule Menela was the sort of girl, who might drop the 
meat for the sake of the shadow; but having indicated the 
presence of a floating, ghostly shadow — which might belong 
to any one or no one — I had no idea of advancing further, 
even to bestow happiness on Phyllis. 

I had argued with my conscience, “If she’s a woman who’s 
ready to throw over the man she’s engaged to, just because he 
isn’t very rich or particularly eligible in her eyes, and because 
some other vague person looming on the horizon has more 
money than Number One, why, it’s a sure sign that she ac- 
cepted Number One because she couldn’t get any one else, 
therefore she doesn’t deserve to keep him, and she does de- 
serve not only to see him slip away, but to see the shadow go 
with him.” 

However, I had not taken Freule Menela’s talents into 
due account — or my own failings.” 

“Is there such a man ?” she asked. 

“There might be,” I cautiously repeated. “The question 
is, are you engaged to Mr. van Buren, or are you not ?” 

“There has been an understanding between his family and 
mine, for many years, that some day we should marry,” she 
answered. “And, of course, he’s very fond of me, though you 


334 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

might not think it from his manner. He often appears to 
feel more interest in women for whom he cares nothing, than 
in me, to whom he is devoted. That is a characteristic of men 
who have his reserved nature.” 

“I’m afraid I don’t understand reserved natures,” said I. 
“If I care for any one, I can’t help showing it.” 

“I have often thought,” went on Freule Menela, “of telling 
Robert van Buren that he and I are not suited to each other. 
My ideal man is very different. And besides, as I said, nothing 
could induce me to settle down in Rotterdam.” 

“You might make that the determining point,” I suggested, 
“if you were looking for an excuse to save his feelings.” 

“Do you really think so ?” she asked. 

“I certainly do. Then you could leave him the choice. 
Rotterdam, without you; the more lively place, with you. 
Oh ! don’t you think, for your sake and his, you ought to do 
this at once ?” 

“And a little for the sake of — the other man ?” she asked, 
archly. 

I dared not inquire, stonily, “What other man ?” lest the 
work I had accomplished should be destroyed in a single 
stroke. So I said 

“Yes, and for the sake of the other man.” 

“You believe it would really matter to him ?” 

She looked up so anxiously as she put this question that, 
quite apart from the interests of Phyllis Rivers, I could not 
have dashed hers, or any other woman’s hopes, by giving an 
unchivalrous answer. Let come what might, I could not de- 
liberately bring the pallor of humiliation to a female face, 
especially after words of mine had once caused it to glow with 
pleasure. 

“How could I believe otherwise?” I demanded; and my 
tone sounded almost too sincere in my own ears. 

For a moment Freule Menela van der Windt did not an- 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 335 
swer, and I hoped that her thoughts had hopped to some 
other branch of the subject; but presently she broke out, as 
if impelled by impulse to utter her thought to a congenial soul. 

“Isn’t it strange how sometimes one seems to know a person 
one has only just met, better than another, with whom one has 
been intimate for years ?” 

“That is often so,” I hurried to assure her, with the idea of 
establishing the commonplaceness of such an experience. 

“You feel it, too ?” Her eyes were fixed on me, and I an- 
swered “Yes,” before I had time to decide whether, at this 
point, it would not be safer not to feel it. 

“I’ve often been told that American men are very impulsive. 
But — are there many like you ?” asked Freule Menela. 

“Lots,” I said quickly. 

“Oh, then it’s really true that it is quite a usual thing 
among your country people, for a man to tell a girl he cares 
for her, when he has seen her only once ?” 

“I — er — really don’t know about that,” I answered, 
beginning to be disturbed in soul. 

“You know only how it is with yourself ?” Freule Menela 
murmured, with a girlish laugh that betrayed suppressed ex- 
citement. “Well, Mr. Starr, I think it would be foolish to pre- 
tend to misunderstand. I have heard much about you — per- 
haps you have heard a little of me ? — yet you have taken me 
by storm. The thing I love best is art. You are a great artist — 
and you are a man of the world. You have all the fire of 
genius — and geniuses have a right to do things which other 
men may not do. I believe you have made me more interested 
in you, in these last two hours we have spent together, than I 
have been in any one else in as many years. And because 
of you, and what you have said — so delicately yet so unmis- 
takably — I am going now to take your advice about Robert.” 

Before I could stop her, even if I had had the courage and 
presence of mind, she walked quickly away from me, and 


336 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

joined Phyllis and van Buren, who were sauntering a few 

yards ahead. 

My brain whirled, and threatened to give way in the horror 
of the situation. I could have shouted aloud with the shrill 
intensity of a drowning man, “Alb, save me!” But Alb was 
far in front, strolling with the van Buren twins, while the one 
van Buren in whom he is really interested walked behind him 
with my temporary aunt. And in any case, he could have 
done nothing. Before my stunned wits had time to rebound, 
Phyllis the sweet and gentle had turned and flown to me, as if 
for refuge, like a homing dove threatened by a hawk. 

“Brother dear,” she whispered, “may I walk with you, 
please ? Freule Menela says there is something she has been 
wanting all day to talk over with Mr. van Buren; so I thought 
I had better leave them alone, and drop behind with you — if 
you don’t mind having me ?” 

“Mind!” I echoed in my turmoil of spirit. “It’s a happy 
relief.” 

“I thought you seemed quite fascinated by Freule Menela,” 
exclaimed the poor innocent one “I asked Mr. van Buren if 
he were not jealous.” 

“How unkind of you !” 

“I didn’t mean to be unkind — at least, I hope I didn’t,” 
said Phyllis. “Only, do you know, dear brother — since I am 
to confide my real feelings to you — I’m never quite sure of 
myself where that girl is concerned. I can’t stand her. I’m 
so sorry for poor Mr. van Buren. What do you suppose he 
answered when I asked him that question about being jealous 
of you — that rather naughty question P He said, ‘Would to 
Heaven she were his, not mine ! ’ ” 

Had I been on St. Lawrence’s gridiron, I could not have 
helped chortling. 

“I’m not at all sure she isn’t,” I muttered, under my breath ; 
but Phyllis caught the words. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 337 

“What do you mean ?” she gasped. “Oh, it can't be you 
mean anything, do you ?” 

“Well, anyhow, I mean that it’s very likely she won’t long be 
his, ” I explained, fired w ith anxiety to please the girl at any cost. 

“It sounds too glorious to be true. It can't be true! But 
if it could ! It’s no use saying I wouldn’t be glad — for poor 
Mr. van Buren’s sake; he’s so much too nice for her — 
mercenary, conceited, selfish little creature.” 

“Right, on every count,” said I. 

“I don’t quite understand you,” said Phyllis. “But I can’t 
help feeling that, if anything splendid does happen, it will be 
all through you — somehow. You promised me, didn’t you ? 
— well, I don’t know exactly what you promised; but it made 
me feel happy and sure everything would come out well, that 
night when you said you’d like to have me for a sister. ” 

“ Did I say that ?” I asked in surprise. 

“Didn't you ? I thought ” 

“Go on thinking so, then,” I sighed; “and anything else 
that will make you happy — little sister. ” 

“Thank you. Now I know, by the mysterious way you’re 
looking at me, that you have done something. I believe you 
made him — I mean Mr. van Buren — come to see us again 
sooner than he intended to.” 

“Perhaps. And perhaps I made him bring Freule Menela 
with him.” 

“Did you ? I wish — but no. I mustn’t think of that.” 

“Wait a few hours and then think what you like,” said I. 
Yet I spoke gloomily. I could see where the Viking was to 
come in. But I could not so clearly see how I was to get out. 

We walked a very long way before any one seemed to 
wonder where we were going, and why we should be going 
there; but at last we came to a tea-garden, or a beer-garden, 
or both; and the L.C.P. said that we must stop and give Tibe 
a bowl of milk. 


338 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Not a member of the party who did not appear singular- 
ly absent-minded, on stopping and grouping with the others 
again, not excepting Tibe himself; but his absent-mindedness 
was caused only by the antics of a water-rat, which he would 
have liked to see added to his milk. When it occurred to him 
to drink the milk, unenriched by such an addition, we were all 
eating pink and white ices, and Dutch cakes that must have 
been delicious to those who had no Freule Menela sticking in 
their throats. 

Phyllis walked beside me all the way back to the hotel, 
and was dearer than ever now that, through my own quixotic 
act, I saw her rapidly becoming unattainable. But, as the 
ladies said good-night to us at the foot of the stairs, Freule 
van der Windt contrived to whisper, as she slipped her hand 
into mine — “For better for worse, I’ve taken your advice, 
M*. Starr. I am absolutely free. ” 

“How did you manage it ?” I heard myself asking. 

“Robert insisted on living in Rotterdam. He wouldn’t 
even consent to winter at The Hague, though it’s so near; so 
his blood is on his own head.” 

“And joy in his heart,” I might have added. But I did 
not speak at all. 

“Haven’t you anything to say?” she asked coyly; though 
her eyes, as they fixed mine, were not coy, but eager; and I 
felt, eerily, that she was wondering whether the millions, of 
which she’d heard, were in English pounds or American 
dollars. 

I hesitated. If I replied “Nothing,” she would probably 
snatch Robert back from Phyllis lips, and I had not gone 
so far along the path of villainy to fail my Burne-Jones Angel 
now. 

“I will tell you what I have to say to-morrow,” I answered, 
in a low voice; and then I am afraid that, to be convincing, I 
almost squeezed her hand. 


XXX 


W E were called early in the morning, to take the 
twins and Freule Menela — the fiancee no 
longer — for a drive through Utrecht, to see 
the beautiful parks and the Cathedral before 
starting on the day’s journey. Since the making of this plan, 
however, many things were changed. Robert and Menela 
were both “disengaged,” and how they would think it de- 
corous to behave to each other, how the twins would treat 
the lady (if the truth had been revealed), remained to be 
seen. If I had had no personal interest at stake, I should 
have found pleasure in the situation, and in watching how 
things shaped themselves; but, as it was, I realized that I 
might be one of the things to be shaped, and that I should be 
lucky if I were allowed to shape myself. 

I thought it well to be late to breakfast, lest the erstwhile 
fiancee and I should meet en tete-a-tete ; and it was evident, 
at a glance, that Lisbeth and Lilli already knew all. The 
admirable Menela had probably told them in their bedroom 
over night, thus giving the pair plenty of solid food for 
dreams; and the pretty creatures were pale, self-conscious, 
and nervous, not knowing how to bear themselves after the 
earthquake which had shaken the relationship of years. 

Robert also was uneasy; but, to my regret, emotion en- 
hanced his good looks. What I had done had not been done 
for his benefit. I had not jeopardized my happiness to make 
him more attractive, to give fire to his eyes, and an expression 
of manly self-control striving with passion, to his already ab- 
surdly perfect features. Though, plainly, he was undergoing 

339 


340 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

some mental crisis, he held liis feelings so well in leash that 
no outsider could have judged whether he were the saddest or 
the happiest of men, and his sisters watched him anxiously, 
hoping to receive a guiding clue for their own behavior. 

As for Freule Menela, she was as composed as ever, 
and had a self-satisfied air, as though, having slept on it, 
she was more pleased than ever with the course she had 
adopted. 

Phyllis knew nothing yet, except what she had gleaned 
from me last night, I was sure of that; but I was not so sure 
about Alb, who wore a clouded brow. Whether he was worry- 
ing over his own affairs, or whether friend Robert had com- 
mandered his hero’s sympathy, I could not guess, and dared 
not ask. Nor had I much time to speculate upon Alb’s busi- 
ness, for I saw by Freule Menela’s eye that my own was press- 
ing, and all my energies were bent in steering clear of her 
during the good-by excursion through Utrecht. 

Luckily, the party distributed itself in two carriages, and 
though I could not resist the fair Menela’s “Come with me, 
Mr. Starr,” fortunately the L.C.P. jumped in with Tibe, 
whose mood was so obstreperous that clearly he did not find 
canal life relaxing. Then arose a discussion between Nell 
and Phyllis as to which should sit in the other carriage, and 
Nell came to us, wishing, perhaps, to avoid Alb, whose society 
seems of late to cast a blight of silence upon her. 

“Now,” said I to myself, “if the late fiancee can’t wind 
her tentacles round a new victim in this vehicle, neither can 
Robert escape her toils by proposing to Phyllis in that one, 
surrounded by his family circle. If he doesn’t seize his chance 
soon, he’ll miss it forever; because once his Freule discovers 
that she isn’t to be claimed by another, she’ll find it conven- 
ient to change her mind about life in Rotterdam. I may be 
saint — or villain — enough to keep her dangling till sunset; 
but then, at latest, I shall have to cut her down; and woe to 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 341 
any Viking who happens to lie about loose and unattached, 
when she falls to earth with a dull thud. ” 

Far be it from the clever lady of The Hague to admit that 
there was a place on earth of which she did not know every- 
thing; and though I have reason to believe that she never saw 
Utrecht till yesterday, she was so busy telling us about it that 
we were behind the others in arriving on board “Mascotte,” 
our appointed rendezvous. 

I noticed instantly that Phyllis was not on deck, helping Alb 
to entertain the twins, as her kind soul would have prompted 
her to do. Of course, she nwght be below, in one of the cabins; 
but where was Robert ? It was a coincidence that he, too, 
should be missing. Yet no one attempted to offer an explana- 
tion. Lilli and Lisbeth merely looked flurried and pink when 
Freule Menela came airily on board with me, and Alb ap- 
peared interested in giving instructions to Hendrik, who dis- 
puted respectfully with Tibe possession of countless yards of 
his beloved cotton waste. 

At last, however, I began to wonder why we did not get 
away. The day’s trip was to be a return to Amsterdam, not 
with the object of reviving impressions of that city, but for the 
pleasure of the run through the River Vecht, which Alb praised 
as the prettiest stream in the Netherlands, and named a 
miniature Thames. It was ten o’clock, and, as usual, we were 
timed to start at ten ; but I did not consider it my place to ask 
the reason why, or any other question about starting. Mine, 
but to do or die — and keep out of reach of Freule Menela. 

It was through Nell that the mystery was solved, as we 
stood chatting on deck. 

“Where’s Phil ?” she inquired of the twins. 

“Gone back to the hotel to find something she forgot to 
pack,” said Lilli. 

“And brother Robert has taken her,” said Lisbeth, with a 
fleeting glance at the self-deposed fiancee 


342 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

This revelation of Phyllis’s diplomacy came upon me with 
a shock. She is such a simple-minded Angel; but I suppose 
all girls are alike in some ways. And she is so kind-hearted, 
she must have been anxious to put Robert out of his misery as 
soon as she could. Well, she couldn’t have done it much sooner. 

“There they come,” cried Lilli. And perhaps I should have 
been tempted to search their faces for news if Freule Menela 
had not turned her back upon the advancing figures, and 
begun to talk, with an air of proprietorship, to me. 

“It’s found!” cried Phyllis, to all whom it might concern. 
“I was so — fond of it, I should have hated losing it. And it 
was so kind of Mr. van Buren to help me.” 

I wondered whether there were others on board beside 
myself who detected in this announcement a double meaning ? 
Something in her voice told me that she really was thankful 
not to have lost the thing of which she was so fond, the thing 
for which she had gone back to the hotel, the thing Mr. van 
Buren had kindly helped her to find. But there was no chance 
for a self-sacrificing brother to question his sister. Freule 
Menela saw to that. 

It was my luck at its worst, to be torn in my mind on this 
exquisite day on the Vecht. Once in a while it dimly comes 
back to me that, in a past existence unbrightened by Nell Van 
Buren and Phyllis Rivers, I came to Holland with the object 
of painting pictures. Never, since my arrival in the bright 
little country of wide spaces, have I had a keener incentive to 
improve the shining hours; but how can a man remember that 
he’s an artist when the girl he loves has engaged herself to 
another man, and one of the few girls he never could love is 
rapidly engaging herself to him ? 

It was in self-defense, not a real desire for work, that I 
fled to “Waterspin” and screened myself behind easel and 
canvas. And then it was but to find that I had jumped from 
the frying-pan into the fire. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 343 

My move was made while “Mascotte” and her fat compan- 
ion lay at rest, that Alb might buy fruit for us from a fruit 
boat; and Freule Menela also availed herself of the quiet 
interval. 

“May I come and watch you paint ?” she asked, in a tone 
which showed that vanity made her sure of a welcome. 

I longed for the brutal courage to say that I could never 
work with an audience; but I remembered letting slip last 
night the fact that I constantly sat sketching on the deck of 
“Mascotte,” during the most crowded hours of life. 

I murmured something, with a smile which needed oiling; 
and, accepting the grudging help of my hand, she floated 
across with an affected little scream. 

“I saw a lovely picture you painted for Miss Rivers,” she 
said, when she was settled in a camp-stool at my side. “Will 
you do one for me ?” 

“With pleasure,” I answered. “This one shall be for you. 
But if you want it to be good, we mustn’t talk. I shall have to 
concentrate my mind on my work.” 

“Thanks for the compliment,” she laughed. “I give you 
leave to forget me — for a little while.” 

So I did my best to take her at her word, and tried impress- 
ionist sketches of the charming and ever-changing scene, 
upon which her presence was the sole blot; the beautiful old 
houses set back from the river on flowery lawns, faded eoats- 
of-arms glowing red and blue and gold over quaint doorways 
shaded by splendid trees; fairy villas rising from billows of 
pink peonies and green hydrangeas; humble cottages, with 
tiny window-panes of twinkling glass, shining out from bowers 
of late roses; dove-gray windmills beckoning across piles of 
golden hay; above, clouds like flocks of snowy sheep, racing 
along wide sky-pastures, blue with the blue of forget-me-nots; 
below, a crystal flood foaming white with water-lilies that 
dipped before the prow of our advancing boat. 


344 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Over this crust of pearl, poised always long-stemmed, 
yellow lilies, like hovering butterflies; and, in a clear space 
of water, each little wave caught the sun and sky reflection, 
so that it seemed rimmed with gold and set with a big, oval 
turquoise. 

“Well — have I pleased you ?” Freule Menela asked at last. 

The moment had come for an understanding. With my 
two hands, unaided I had saved Phyllis, and now I must save 
— or lose — myself. Of course there was no choice which 
to do. I had played my fish and caught it, and as it was not 
the kind of fish I liked for dinner, I must tear it off the hook 
and throw it back into the sea, wriggling. I told myself that it 
was a bad, as well as an unattractive fish, that if I hadn’t 
hooked it, most surely it would have bolted the beautiful little 
golden minnow I had been protecting. Still — still, there it 
was, smiling on the hook, that bad fish, trusting the hand 
which had caught and would betray it. It deserved nothing 
of that hand or any other hand; but suddenly, I found mine 
powerless. 

“Phyllis, Phyllis,” I groaned in spirit, “you will be my 
death, for to save you I caught this fish; now I may have to 
eat it, and it will surely choke me.” 

Before my eyes stretched a horrible vista of years, lived 
through with Freule Menela — mean little, vain, disloyal 
Freule Menela — by my side, contentedly spending my money 
and bearing my name, while I faded like a lovely lily on the 
altar of self-sacrifice. 

In another instant I should have said yes, she had pleased 
me; she would have answered; and just because she is a wo- 
man I should have had to say something which she might 
have taken as she chose; so that it would have been all over 
for Ronald Lester Starr; but at this moment the two boats 
began to slow down. I suppose that Toon, at the steering- 
wheel of “Waterspin,” must have received a message, which I 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 345 
was too preoccupied to hear; and as speed slackened, came 
the voice which others know as that of my Aunt Fay. 

Never had it been so welcome, sounded so sweet, as now, 
when it brought my reprieve. 

“Ronald dear,” cooed the mock-Scottish accents, “you’d 
better get ready at once to lunch on shore, for Jonkheer 
Brederode has another surprise for us — and I know that by 
this time your hands, if not your face, are covered with paint.” 

Wonderful woman! It was as if inspiration had sent her 
to my rescue. Not that I am at all sure she would have laid 
herself out to rescue me from any snare, had she known of its 
existence; for though, before the watery world I am “Ronny 
dear” to her, she is not as considerate with me in private as 
she used to be when we first started. 

We have been frank with each other at times, the L.C.P. 
and I, and the pot has said in plain words what it thinks of the 
kettle’s true character. When the time comes for us to part it 
may be that her little ladyship will be still more frank, and let 
me know, in polite language, that seeing the last of her bor- 
rowed nephew is “good riddance of bad rubbish.” Neverthe- 
less, her extraordinary, though indescribable, cleverness has 
woven a kind of web about us all; and whether I am able to 
respect the L.C.P. or not, I was conscious of passionate gra- 
titude to her as she arrested me with the bad fish half-way to 
my mouth. 

The boats stopped at a private landing, small, but so re- 
markable that I thought for an instant the whole thing must 
be an optical illusion. 

We had come to rest in the deep shadow of enormous trees. 
Leaning over the rail of a snug little harbor two dummy men 
in rakish hats and dark coats stared at the new arrivals with 
lack-luster eyes. And the dummies, and the wooden wall on 
which they were propped, with a strange painted motto con- 
sisting of snakes, and dogs, and sticks, and a yard measure, 


346 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

were all repeated with crystal-clear precision in the green 

mirror of quiet water. 

“How annoying, just as we were going to have another 
delicious talk!” exclaimed Menela. 

“Yes,” said I. “But it can’t be helped. Where are we ? Is 
this fairyland ?” 

“It must be the place of Heer Dudok de Wit,” answered 
the young lady, snappily. “He is a wonderful man, and many 
people say that no visit to Holland can be complete without a 
visit to his house. He’s a great character — has walked all over 
the world,, and brought back curiosities for his museum, to 
which he gives free admission. And from what I hear, there 
is nothing else he won’t give, if asked for it — he’s so generous 
— from a night’s lodging or all his best peaches, up to a pre- 
sent of a thousand gulden to a distressed stranger. This can 
be no other house than his; and I believe Rudolph Brederode 
is a far-off cousin of Heer de Wit, just as Rudolph is of mine, 
on the other side. I don’t see our host, though. Perhaps he is 
away on one of his walking tours. ” 

“Or in bed,” said I. “Taking a noon-day nap, to forget 
the heat.” 

“No, for one of his peculiarities is, never to go to bed. He 
hasn’t been in bed for twenty-five years. I don’t know how he 
sleeps — but, look ! there he is now. I recognize him from 
photographs in newspapers.” 

My eyes followed her nod, which appeared to be aimed at 
the river. I looked for a boat, but spied a head floating among 
water-lilies. 

It was not a loose head of some early Dutch martyr mi- 
raculously preserved — as seemed possible in a place of such 
surprises — for it smiled and bowed, and addressed Brederode 
as its dear Rudolph. 

It’s wet hair, glittering like silver in the water, was rather 
long, it’s eyes were like brown jewels, it had faultless features. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 347 
not at all of a modern cast, but like those one sees in a seven- 
teenth-century portrait; and it’s smile, even when visible only 
as far down as the lower lip, was charming. 

The famous Mr. Dudok de Wit, bobbing nearer, explained 
that he had unduly prolonged his daily swimming bath, owing 
to the sultriness of the day. As it was, he had been in the water 
no more than an hour or two, but he was delighted to see us, 
would come out at once, and expect us to lunch with him at 
Breukelen, which is the name of his place. 

He did come out, in a neat bathing-suit, desiring us to 
follow him into the house, where we might amuse ourselves 
until he was dressed, wandering among his treasures in the 
drawing-room. 

The luncheon in the quaint old house, the stroll through 
the grounds and the hour in the museum, were among Alb’s 
successes; but I was past grudging it to him; besides, he 
flaunted no triumphant airs. Why should he, when Phyllis 
had eyes only for her Viking, and Nell, in a newly developed 
appreciation of her twin cousins, had no time to remember his 
existence ? 

I did think that she might have stretched out a hand to 
save me from Menela, but if she had any conception of what 
was going on, she thought me able to take care of myself, and 
I should have been left to the tender mercies of the creature 
I had freed had it not been for the L.C.P. 

During the afternoon, when we had left Breukelen and were 
gliding on, along the lily-burdened river toward Amsterdam, 
she unobtrusively made it her business to protect me from the 
sallies of the enemy, even' engaging that enemy herself, as if 
she were my squire at arms. Now, if never before, she was 
worth her weight in gold, and as I saw her politely entangle 
the unwilling Menela in conversation, I vowed to buy her a 
present worth having when we arrived in Amsterdam. 


XXXI 


W HEN a man sacrifices himself for a woman, he 
naturally likes to have the satisfaction of know- 
ing that he has made a success; and I felt that 
a melancholy pleasure would be mine should I 
learn that Phyllis had profited by my kindness. It would have 
been flattering to my self-esteem, also, though perhaps dis- 
astrous to my ribs, if Robert van Buren had thrown himself 
upon my bosom, thanking me for his deliverance from bond- 
age. I had to remind myself that he could not possibly know 
what he owed me, or I should have been unjust enough to 
accuse him of ingratitude. 

A heavy shower came on while we were driving in open 
cabs through Amsterdam, therefore the moment we arrived at 
the well-remembered hotel of our last visit, the various mem- 
bers of the band had to skurry off to their rooms and change 
their drenched garments. As no plan of campaign had been 
arranged for the rest of the day — it was then past five — we 
did not meet again, as a party, until dinner-time, when we 
all came together with the exception of Brederode, who 
absented himself to dine with a friend. 

It was the first time that he had been away, and to my 
surprise I discovered that, when a Mariner has carried an 
Albatross about with him week after week, he actually misses 
the creature if he mislays it. Somehow, we seemed to be at 
loose ends without Brederode. Lacking an organizer, nobody 
knew what to do; and if he had wished to enhance his value, he 
couldn’t have chosen a better way. As if at a loss for any other 
subject of common interest, we fell to talking of the absent one 

348 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 349 
— all save Nell, who listened in silence, not once joining in 
until Freule Menela capped an anecdote of Robert’s in praise 
of his hero, by remarking 

“Of course Rudolph’s brave enough; but that’s no particu- 
lar credit to him. All Brederodes have been brave, since the 
days of the Water Beggar. But I’m afraid he’s quite aware of 
that, and all his other perfections. He is rather conceited, and 
as for obstinacy ” 

Then at last Nell had something to say for herself. “Doesn’t 
it strike you,” she asked with elaborate sweetness, “that a 
person may have self-respect and firmness without being 
either obstinate or conceited ?” 

“Well!” exclaimed Robert, in the pause which followed, 
“that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you defend Rudolph, 
Cousin Helen.” 

“He has proved himself such a faithful skipper that it’s my 
duty, as the owner of the boat, to defend the good qualities 
which have served us best,” replied Nell, looking so brilliantly 
pretty, with her flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, that I felt 
there might still be consolations in life for me, if only I could 
attain them. 

The situation was now becoming strained on all sides. 
Not that it was made so by the conversation I have just set 
down, but by the peculiar relations of several persons in the 
party. 

The original plan of the Robert-Menela-Twins visit was 
that, having arrived at Utrecht, they should be taken on by us 
to Rotterdam, before “Mascotte” and “Waterspin” bore us 
northward again to Zeeland. This roundabout way of journey- 
ing was the penalty of our beautiful day on the Vecht; be- 
cause, to see the Vecht after Utrecht, we were obliged to land 
at Amsterdam; and as there was no nearer way of reaching 
Zeeland than by passing Rotterdam, we were not going out of 
our way in landing the van Buren party so near home. But to 


350 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

go by canal from Amsterdam to Rotterdam would take us one 
long day; and as we had a pair of severed lovers among us, 
that long day’s association, on a small boat, would be awk- 
ward. 

The obvious thing was for Robert to invent a pretext and 
vanish. But Robert, no doubt, had his own reasons for wish- 
ing to stay, and besides, he had the excuse that he could not 
go without taking his sisters. If his sisters went, they could 
not well leave the friend they had brought with them; neither 
did it seem practicable for her to depart in their company 
as she had just jilted their brother, who would have to act as 
escort for all three. This difficulty must have presented itself 
to Freule Menela, for she gave no indication of a desire to 
leave us. Perhaps she thought it better to endure the ills she 
knew than fly to others she knew not; and by way of accus- 
toming herself to those ills, she kept unremittingly near me, 
when, after dinner, we assembled in “Aunt Fay’s” inevitable 
sitting-room. 

If I were a woman I should have been on the verge of 
hysterics, but being handicapped by manhood, I merely 
yearned to bash some one on the head as a relief to my feelings ; 
and lest that some one should be Freule Menela, at last I got 
to my feet and announced my intention of taking a walk in 
the rain. 

“What wouldn’t I give to go with you!” exclaimed the 
young lady. “It’s so close here, and I’ve had no exercise to- 
day. I am fond of walking in the rain.” 

“I will chaperon you,” said the L.C.P. 

“Oh, we need not trouble you, Lady MacNairne,” protested 
Menela. “It might give you rheumatism; and girls in Holland 
are allowed to be very independent. ” 

My heart sank. How could even the ever resourceful L.C.P. 
get round that sharp corner ? 

She was equal to it. “You are very considerate,” she re- 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 351 
plied, “but I am old-fashioned and used to Scotch ways; 
and in Scotland even elderly persons like myself are used also 
to walking in the rain, otherwise we should seldom walk at 
all. Indeed, we rather like rain, in pleasant company.” 

With this, she got up briskly, and it was as a trio that we 
had our wet walk through the streets of Amsterdam. 

The shops were still bright, however, and I stopped my 
two companions under their dripping umbrellas, in front of a 
window blazing with a display of jewelry. 

“Now, what should you say was the most beautiful thing 
of the lot ?” I asked. 

“That ring,” promptly answered Menela, pointing to a 
pigeon-blood cabuchon ruby, of heart shape, set with clear 
white diamonds. 

It was a ring for a lover to offer to his lady. 

“You are right,” agreed the L.C.P. “There’s nothing else in 
the window to touch that.” 

“Let’s go in and buy it, then,” I said. “I have a friend to 
whom I should like to make a little present.” 

“Little present!” echoed Menela. “It will cost you three 
thousand gulden at the least.” 

“That is not too costly, considering everything,” said I, 
mysteriously. And I was bubbling with malicious joy, as, by 
right of purchase, the ring became mine. “Each one of them 
considers it as good as hers,” I said to myself. “To-morrow 
evening, at Rotterdam, if I am safely spared from Freule 
Menela, and she is gone out of my life forever, that ring may 
change hands; but it won’t go to The Hague.” 

I dreamed all night that I was pursued by Robert’s escaped 
fiancee, and dodging her, ran into the arms of Sir Alec Mac- 
Nairne, who denounced me fiercely as a murderer. Nor was 
there much relief in awaking; for I knew that in her room, 
divided from me only by a friendly wall or two, Freule Menela 
lay planning how to trap me. 


352 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“If I am to be saved,” I said to myself, “I’m afraid it won’t 
be by my own courage or resource. I must look to my aunt. 
She fought for me nobly all day; but there are still twelve 
hours of danger. With her and Menela it’s a case of Greek 
meeting Greek. Will she be clever enough to pull me through ?” 


XXXII 


I KNEW I looked haggard, and hoped I looked interest- 
ing, when I appeared in the big hall of the hotel after 
breakfast in the morning, ten minutes before the time at 
which we were to start for Rotterdam. 

There were the twins, talking to Nell. There was Brede- 
rode, studying a map of the waterways; there was the L.C.P. 
teaching Tibe a trick which for days he had been mildly 
declining to learn; there were Phyllis and the Viking wrapt 
in each other in the seclusion of a corner. But where was 
Freule Menela ? 

I asked the question aloud, and self-consciously. 

“She’s gone,” announced the lady who is not my aunt. 
“Gone ?” I echoed. 

“Yes, home to The Hague. She had a telegram, and was 
obliged to leave at once, by the first train, instead of waiting 
to travel slowly with us. ” 

“Oh !” said I; adding, hypocritically, “What a pity !” 

The small and rather pretty mouth of the L.C.P. arched 
upward, so I suppose she smiled. 

“Yes, isn’t it ?” said she. 

Nobody else spoke, but I felt that the silence of Robert 
and the twins was more eloquent than words. 

When I had overcome the first giddy rapture of returning 
life, and was sure that I was steady on my feet, I dared to 
dally with the subject. I asked if bad news had come for 
Freule Menela, expressed devout relief that it had not, and 
piped regret at being deprived of a farewell. 

“She left a message,” explained the L.C.P. “I saw her 
353 


354 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

off — as was my duty, since she did not care to disturb dear 
Nell, so early in the morning. You see, I alone was in her 
confidence. I knew, last night, after you had all gone to bed, 
that the telegram might come, and I promised if it did, to go 
with her to the station. Remind me to give you the message 
— when we’ve started.” 

As she said this, I felt instinctively that I should have seen 
deep meaning in her eyes, were they not hidden by their 
blue glasses; and curiosity to know the worst battled with 
reluctance to hear it. Perhaps it was well that at this moment 
Alb gathered us for a start, and that there was no chance for 
private conversation in the carriage, w T hich took Nell, one of 
the twins, and the Chaperon with me to the Rowing and 
Yachting Club, where “Mascotte” and “Waterspin” awaited 
us. This respite gave me time to get on my armor, and fasten 
up several, if not all the buckles — some of which I realized 
were lamentably weak. 

On board, there was the usual business of putting our 
belongings to rights after an absence on shore; and when 
I came on to “Mascotte” from “Waterspin,” already Amster- 
dam — with its smoke cloud and widespreading mass of 
buildings, like gray bubbles against the clear sky — was sink- 
ing out of sight. We were teuf-teufing comfortably along a 
modest canal, leading us southward, and Alb was explaining 
to the L.C.P. and the van Buren girls that, to reach Rotter- 
dam by the shortest way, he meant to avoid the places we had 
seen : Aalsmeer, with its menagerie of little tree-animals, and 
the great Haarlemmer-meer Polder. Suddenly, as the motor’s 
speed increased, after taking me on, Phyllis left Robert and 
Nell, to come to my side. A look from her beautiful eyes warn- 
ed me that something interesting was due, and by one accord, 
■we moved as far as possible from our friends. 

“Best of brothers,” she whispered; “I’ve been dying to 
thank you. At last my chance has come. You are wonderful! 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 355 
You said you would, you know, and that I was to trust you; 
but I never thought you could. How did you do it ? ” 

“With my little hatchet,” I answered dreamily. 

Her eyes opened wide. “Your — what ?” 

“It needed a sharp instrument,” said I. “But how did you 
know it was mine ?” 

“You were with her so much, and had so many private 
talks. I felt you had a plan. But I could only hope , not expect. 
Do tell me everything. ” 

“Suppose you tell me everything,” I bargained. “We 
may be playing at cross purposes. What has happened to 
you ?” 

“I’m engaged,” said Phyllis. “Isn’t it glorious ?” 

“I don’t know that I should go so far as to say that,” I 
replied, wondering why my heart was not aching harder. 

“Perhaps, then, you’ve never been in love ?” she suggested. 
“Oh, haven’t I ? I’ve been in nothing else lately — except 
hot water. ” 

“You do say such odd things. But I bless you, if I can’t 
understand you. You’ve made me so happy.” 

“You didn’t tell me you were in love with Robert.” 

“Of course not — then. It would have been too bold, even 
to tell myself, when — he was engaged to some one else. But 
pity’s akin to love, isn’t it ? And there was no harm in pitying 
him because he was bound to a — a creature , who could never 
deserve his love. ” 

“Even if he hadn’t given it to you.” 

“That was fate , wasn’t it ? But if it hadn’t been for my 
clever brother, we could never have belonged to each other.” 

“Some men are born brothers, some achieve brotherhood, 
others have it thrust upon them,” I muttered. “You and he 
had better take advantage of the lull to be married,” I said 
aloud. 

“The lull ?” 


356 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“In Freule Menela. She’ll be hailing and thundering and 
lightning soon.” 

“Oh, do you think she’ll try to get Robert back again ?” 
gasped Phyllis. 

“Unless another and riper fruit drops into her mouth.” 

“As if it would! You frighten me. Robert did beg last 
night that I’d marry him almost at once, and not go back 
to England — unless — on our honeymoon., I told him I 
wouldn’t think of such a thing. But — perhaps — oh, we 
couldn't lose each other now. I do believe we were made for 
one another.” 

“I begin to believe so, too,” said I. 

And as that belief increased, so decreased the pain of my 
loss. Phyllis still is, and ever will be, a Burne-Jones Angel; 
and when, with her sleeves rolled up, she makes cake in the 
six-foot-by-six kitchen of “Waterspin,” among the blue china 
and brasses, she is enough to melt the heart of Diogenes. 
Nevertheless, I cannot break mine at losing a girl who was 
born for a Robert van Buren. After all, Nell is more bewild- 
eringly beautiful, and has twice Phyllis’s magnetism. She 
has too fine a sense of humor to fall in love with a man’s inches 
and muscles. That one speech of Phyllis’s taught me resigna- 
tion, and showed me in a flash that, despite her charms, she 
is somewhat early Victorian. 

I glanced toward Nell, on whose brilliant face indifference 
to her good-looking cousin was expressed, as she stood talking 
to him — probably about himself — and wondered how, for a 
little while, my worship could have strayed from her to Phyllis. 
A girl born for Robert van Buren ! — A sense of calm, beatific 
brotherliness stole through my veins. Nell had never been 
so lovely or so lovable, and I resolved to find out from my 
sister if she still thought there might be hope for me in that 
direction. 

“I shouldn’t keep Robert waiting,” I went on, without a 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 357 
pang. “There’s no telling what Freule Menela mightn’t do. 
She’s clever — as well as spiteful.” 

“And poor Robert is so honorable,” sighed Phyllis. “If 
he’d known that you were working to — to free him, he might 
have felt it was a plot, and have refused to accept his release. 
You don’t think I ought to tell him, do you ?” 

“Certainly not,” said I. “That’s our secret.” 

“How good you are! Well, I’ll take your advice. Yet it 
does seem so strange — to be married, and live in Holland, 
when I never thought that anything could be really nice out of 
England. But Robert seems to me exactly like an English- 
man : that’s why I love him so dreadfully.” 

“And I suppose you seem to him exactly like a Dutch girl : 
and that’s why he loves you so dreadfully, ” was the answer in 
my mind; but I kept it there. It might have dashed Phyllis’s 
happiness to realize this truth. 

“If I let Robert make arrangements for our marriage al- 
most at once, Freule Menela couldn’t get him back, could 
she, for he would be more bound to me than he ever was to 
her,” said my sister. 

“In that line alone lies safety,” I replied. “Have you told 
Miss Van Buren — your stepsister, I mean ?” 

“Oh yes, as soon as it happened, of course. Nell and I 
never have secrets from each other — at least, we haven’t till 
lately. I thought she would have guessed, but do you know, 
she didn't? She fancied, from things I’d said, that I was 
making up my mind to — that is, to try and learn to care for 
another person. She disapproved of my doing that, it seems, 
which is the reason she’s been so odd. Not that she didn’t 
consider us suited to each other — the other one and I — but 
she thought, with all his faults, he was so much of a man that 
it wasn’t fair for a girl to accept his love if she had to try and 
learn to care for him simply because he happened to be there. 
I see now, in the light of this new happiness, that she was 


358 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

quite right. But I didn’t dream then, that the one man I 
could really care for, could ever be more to me than a dear 
friend. And a girl feels so humiliated to be thinking of a man 
who’s engaged to some one else. She gets the idea that the 
best thing would be to occupy her mind with another man, 
if there’s anybody who likes her very much. And Lady Mac- 
Nairne has always been hinting this last fortnight — but, 
oh no, I’m not thinking what I’m saying ! Even though you 
are my brother, I’ve no right to tell you that.” 

“Sister, I insist that you shall tell me,” I said, with all 
my native fierceness. And Phyllis is not a girl to rebel, if a 
male person commands. 

“Well, then — but she is perhaps mistaken. I hope now 
that she is.” 

“In thinking what ?” 

“That — that Jonkheer Brederode cares more for me than 
for Nell.” 

“I wonder,” said I. 

“Oh course,” went on Phyllis modestly, “Nell’s a hundred 
times prettier and more interesting than I am (though, thank 
goodness, Robert doesn’t think so), but she snubbed the 
Jonkheer so dreadfully at first, and then, after she’d changed 
and been nice to him for a day or two, she got worse than ever. 
At least, she hardly ever speaks to him at all. She just keeps 
out of his way, and leaves him to — others. So his self-respect 
may have been hurt (I can’t say vanity as I might with some 
men, because Jonkheer Brederode isn’t a bit vain, though he 
has a right to be) and he may have turned his thoughts to- 
ward one who sympathized with him. Several little things 
lately have looked as if it were so; but I do pray it’s not, now 
that I’m so happy. It would be too hard if he were to bear a 
double disappointment, after the trouble he has taken, and 
the sacrifices he has made — leaving his beautiful home and 
all its luxuries, and the friends who appreciate him as a 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 359 
splendid fellow and a grand sportsman, to be skipper week 
after week on this little boat.” 

“You forget that he has had the privilege of my society,” 
I reminded her. 

“Oh yes, I know you must be great chums, or he wouldn’t 
have come. But Robert says ” 

“What does Robert say ?” 

“Nothing. Only that he and Jonkheer Brederode have 
known each other so long, he thinks it odd never to have 
heard him mention your name as his friend.” 

“Alb is singularly reserved,” I remarked. 

“So I said to Robert, and he admitted it. But it was rather a 
coincidence that he wanted to know us, wasn’t it ? However, 
I suppose your friendship must have made up to him for 
everything he’s suffered. I did dread his learning about 
Robert and me, for fear it might hurt him, and Robert did 
too, a little; for Robert is so adorably foolish, he thinks every 
one must care for me. But he told him this morning.” 

“What did Alb say ?” I asked. 

“He congratulated Robert as sweetly as possible; but Rob- 
ert said his face changed when he heard the news. I didn’t 
dare to look up when the Jonkheer came and made me nice 
wishes, for fear he might be looking sad; and there was a 
heavy sound in his voice, I thought. Oh dear, life’s very 
complicated, isn’t it ?” 

“Yes,” I admitted. “Even in Holland.” 

Perhaps these women are right. Perhaps Alb’s heart has 
been caught in the rebound; but, lest it hasn’t, and he under- 
takes to cut me out with Nell, it is necessary that I lose no 
time in using my best wiles with her. 

While Phyllis was hanging in the balance, she was as 
desirable as a rosy apple just out of reach; but now that she 
is smugly satisfied to be in the hands of another her ethereal 
charm is fled. 


3C0 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I must congratulate van Buren,” I said, “or he will believe 
I’m jealous.” 

So I shook hands with the Viking, having blessed the pair, 
and was in the act of annexing Nell when the alleged Lady 
MacNairne found it convenient to give me Freule Menela’s 
message. 

“You wanted to hear it, didn’t you ?” she asked, when 
Nell had drifted away to the twins, whose society, though not 
enlivening, she apparently preferred to poor Alb’s. 

“I’ve waited so long, that I could have waited a little 
longer,” I said, following the copper-gold head with wist- 
ful eyes. 

“This is your gratitude!” exclaimed the L.C.P. “You 
don’t seem to realize that I’ve saved you.” 

I looked at her, only to be baffled as usual by the blue 
barrier of glass. 

“You don’t deserve all the trouble I’ve taken,” she went 
on. “Or that I should tell you anything about it. Come, Tibe, 
let’s go below. Darling doggie, you’ve spoiled me for every- 
body else. Y ou are always appreciative. Nobody else is. ” 

“You think that, because he happens to have a tail to wag, 
and others haven’t,” said I. “I consider myself as good as 
Tibe, any day, though handicapped in some ways. I’ll soon 
show you that I’m not ungrateful, when you’ve let me know 
exactly what cause I have for gratitude. Have you murdered 
the late fiancee, and thrown her out of your hotel window into 
the canal ?” 

“I’ve got rid of her just as effectively,” returned the L.C.P. 
“I went and talked to her in her room last night, when she 
was undressing. Ugh! but she was plain in her wrapper. It 
was a pink flannellet one. Imagine it, with her skin.” 

“I’d rather not,” said I. 

“If it weren’t for me, probably you’d often have had to see 
her in it. Well, I made an excuse that she’d looked tired, and 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 361 
complained of the noise under her windows preventing her 
sleeping. I offered her some trional, and then — I just linger- 
ed. She thought it wise to be nice to — your aunt, and I turned 
the conversation to you. She said you were charming. I said 
you would be, if you hadn’t such a terrible temper. I said you 
were almost mad with it sometimes, when you were a little 
boy. Yes, I did, really — you ought to thank me. I dare say 
you were a horrid little boy. But she didn’t seem to mind that 
much. She told me that she got along splendidly with bad- 
tempered people: they were always nice to her. That dis- 
couraged me a tiny bit, but I hadn’t played any really high 
trumps yet. I went on to say you were very delicate, but she 
seemed quite pleased at that, although, if she only knew it, 
she’d be hideous in black. She said she thought delicate men 
were the most interesting, so that drove me to desperation, 
and after I’d praised you a little, just enough to be realistic 
for an aunt, I said what a shame it was about that will of your 
father’s. She pricked up her ears then, and wanted to know 
what I meant. ‘ Hasn’t he told you ?’ I asked. And I was 
shocked to hear you hadn’t, because, I said, it would be more 
honest to let people know how one stood, the position being 
so peculiar. Your father had left every red cent away from 
you, I said, in case you married a foreigner; and it was such 
a blow that she didn’t even notice that I’d committed an 
Americanism. She couldn’t speak for a whole minute, and 
then she asked if you hadn’t tried to dispute the will. That 
would have been no use, said I. It wasn’t the kind you could 
dispute. You often fell in love with girls, not Americans, but 
you were bound to marry a compatriot in the end, unless you 
could find a foreigner with enough money to support you. 
Even after all that she held on to you by the ragged edge. 
Couldn’t you make a lot of money, she asked, with your 
pictures, which are so famous ? They weren’t popular, I said, 
and though the critics always praise them, you could hardly 


362 THE BO TOR CHAPERON 

ever sell. ‘Besides/ said I, ‘he’s so lazy, he doesn’t paint a 

decent-sized picture once in three years.’ ” 

“Good heavens!” I exclaimed. “What a character you 
gave me. It’s a wonder she didn’t rush to Robert van Buren’s 
door, and cry to him that she’d reconsidered.” 

“I saved him, too, for Phyllis’s sake. It was too late for her 
to go to him at that hour, or even send a note, as I saw by her 
eye she thought of doing. I stayed with her till after twelve, 
on purpose. And the last thing I said was, that I thought her 
decision not to accept Mr. van Buren so wise, as such an in- 
telligent woman as she might marry any one. It showed, said 
I, how undeserving he was, that the minute she took herself 
from him, he asked another girl to be his wife. ‘ Has he ? ’ 
she almost screamed. ‘Yes,’ said I. ‘Didn’t you know? He 
is now engaged to Miss Rivers, with the approval of his 
sisters, and a telegram has been sent to his mother, telling her 
all: ” 

This was news worth hearing, and I forgave the L.C.P. the 
inopportuneness of her interruption with Nell 

“Who told vou about van Buren’s engagement to Phyllis ?” 
I asked. 

“No one. But I thought they ought to be engaged, if they 
weren’t, and knew they never would be if Menela weren’t 
got rid of. 

“But about the telegram to Mrs. van Buren ” 

“The minute I went to my room, I sent for a waiter, and 
wrote one, without signing it. I hoped she’d think it came 
from her son, and that, in his excitement, he’d forgotten to 
put his name.” 

“She’ll be furious,” said I. “Freule Menela told me — 
and probably it’s true — that her future mother-in-law had 
done everything she could to bring about the match.” 

“Perhaps. But she’s tremendously proud of Robert, so the 
twins say. Once she knows that Menela deliberately threw 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 363 
him over, she’d never want him to have anything to do with 
the girl again. And Phyllis Rivers isn’t penniless, you know. 
You’ve paid a generous half of the expenses of this trip, for 
which, it seems, some money she’d had left to her was to be 
used. She’s kept most of that; and she has about a hundred 
and fifty pounds sterling a year besides. She’ll have enough 
for pocket-money, when she and Robert are married; and she 
comes of very good people : her great-great-grandfather was 
a viscount, or baron, or something. That will appeal to old 
lady van Buren, when she finds it out.” 

“And if Nell should happen to marry a rich man, he would 
be charmed to do something for the sweet little stepsister,” I 
added. 

The L.C.P. turned on me shrewdly. “You seem to be 
very sure of that. I suppose you judge him by yourself. You 
think Nell’s husband may be a rich American ?” 

“I hope so,” said I. “And a generous one. But talking of 
generosity — I promised to prove to you that I am no less 
grateful than Tibe, though I may not have as effective ways of 
showing it. Strange little stage-aunt of mine, I do thank you 
for saving me. I do realize that, if it weren’t for you, Freule 
van der Windt at all events, would have secured a rich Amer- 
ican husband, no matter what Miss Van Buren’s luck may be. 
I do realize that, but for your fibs and fancies, I should have 
been a lost man, for certainly I should not have been equal 
to saving myself from that woman. By this one night’s work 
alone, if by nothing else, you’ve more than earned your aunt- 
salary and extras. That ring you helped me choose last 
night ” 

“Don’t go on,” she cut me short. “Didn’t I tell you the 
other day when you were offering me a bribe, that I didn’t 
want anything, and wouldn’t have it — not a diamond ring, a 
pearl ring — nor even a ruby ring. I know you think me a 
mercenary little wretch, and that you’ve put up with me all 


364 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

this time only because you couldn’t do without me; while as 
for you, of course you’re only an episode in my life. Still, I’d 
like you to understand that I haven’t done this thing for what 
I could get out of it. I’ve done it — for you. Please remember 
that, when you’re counting up how much I’ve cost you on this 
trip. Count what I’ve saved you, too.” 

“By Jove, I’m not likely to forget that!” said I. “If the 
thing had ended by my being the fiance — it doesn’t bear 
dwelling on. But I want you to have the ring. I saw, all yes- 
terday afternoon and evening, what you were up to on my 
behalf, and I bought the ring on purpose to give to you, if you 
pulled me through, as I half thought you would.” 

“It was born and bred for an engagement ring,” she said. 
“Give it to — the girl you’re going to marry.” 

“I haven’t asked her yet.” 

“You mean to, I suppose.” 

“I suppose so. But she may not accept me. Do you think 
she will ?” 

“If I have an opinion, I’m not going to tell you. Only — 
keep your ring.” 

So I had to keep it. And all day, while again we passed 
flowery Boskoop (not so flowery now) quaint Gouda, and the 
other little towns which carried me back in mind to the be- 
ginning of our trip, I wondered and puzzled over the change 
in that lady of mystery, the L.C.P. 


XXXIII 


W E slept in Rotterdam, at the old hotel in the 
park where the Angels were staying when first 
they came into my life. 

The next day was a memorable one in van 
Buren annals, for the new fiancee was to be received as such, 
into the bosom of the family. 

Robert and the twins had left us on our arrival in Rotter- 
dam, for the town house is still closed for the summer, and 
the “residence” is at Scheveningen. It was for the brother 
and sisters to pave the way for Phyllis, and solve (if they 
could) the mystery which must have wrapped the unsigned 
telegram announcing the engagement. 

In the morning, before any of us had had breakfast, back 
came Robert in one of Brederode’s cast-off automobiles (Alb 
seems to shed motor-cars and motor-boats along the path of 
life as most people shed old shoes) bringing a note from 
Madame at the Villa van Buren. 

What it said I shall probably never know, but Robert’s 
too handsome face was a shade less tranquil than usual, and 
I guessed that, as Nell would say, he had had to be very 
Frisian before he succeeded in persuading his still more 
Frisian mother that Phyllis Rivers is a desirable substitute 
for Freule Menela van der Windt. 

In any case, he had persuaded her — he wouldn’t be the 
Viking that he is, if he hadn’t; and though by the shadow 
round his calm gray eyes, it had probably taken half, or all of 
the night, the note he produced must have been satisfactory, 
for Phyllis brightened as she read it. 

365 


366 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Soon after, the visit to Scheveningen was arranged; but 
Robert had, no doubt, prepared the girls for the necessity of 
making it, for Nell and Phyllis both came down to breakfast 
in their prettiest dresses, looking irresistible. And an hour 
later, with motor-veils over their hats, they went off with 
Robert in he automobile. 

They were to spend the day, for people in the Hollow Land 
enjoy their pleasures as much by quantity as quality, es- 
pecially their friends’ society; and I could only hope that 
a certain wistfulness of expression, as she looked back from 
the tonneau of the red car, meant that Nell would rather have 
remained with some of those who were left behind. 

If she had stayed in Rotterdam, and relied upon me for 
entertainment, I should certainly have proposed to her. As 
it was, I passed the day somewhat gloomily, reflecting on the 
time I had wasted, while I had her by my side. Now, I re- 
minded myself, the trip as planned was drawing to a close. 
There remained the visit to Zeeland — an affair of a few days. 
After that, what ? Getting back to Rotterdam again, for the 
last time. Good-bys. Selling the boat, perhaps — at least, 
Nell used to talk of that in the first days, when the end seemed 
far-off and vague. 

The L.C.P. kept to her sitting-room on the plea that she 
had “a lot of writing to do,” and Tibe was on guard. As for 
the Albatross, he went off without excuse to seek the friends 
of his past, with which the Mariner has no connection. 

A premonition of the future came upon me. I remembered 
the Prince in the fairy tale, who was given by the Fates three 
magic citrons, and told that each one contained a beautiful 
sylph, who would appear to him as he cut the rind of her 
prison. She would ask for a drink of water, and if he wished 
to keep her for his wife he must instantly obey or she would 
vanish, never to return, even in response to the most fervent 
prayer. When the Prince cut the first citron, the fairy vision 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 367 
which flashed before his eyes was so dazzling, that, bewilder- 
ed, he let her go. With the second the same thing happened, 
and it was only by the greatest effort of self-control that he 
preserved the third beauty for his own, eventually marrying 
her, as a virtuous Prince should. 

“Now,” said I to myself, “I’m not as well off as that Prince. 
Being only a commoner, I ought to consider that I’m lucky 
to have two citrons, where he had three. I’ve let the first 
sylph vanish, and if I don’t secure the second, I need never 
hope to get such another present of fairy citrons, for they’ll 
have run out of stock.” 

The thought of going gray-haired to my grave, bereft of 
Phyllis and Nell citrons, all through my own folly, made me 
feel elderly at twenty-seven; and perhaps my day of gloom 
was not wasted, because, long before the red car brought back 
the girl I have lost and the girl I have still to wdn, I had made 
up my mind to propose to Miss Van Buren before I should be 
twenty-four hours older. 

When Alb appeared, it seemed that he had been among 
his aquatic friends, tactfully seeking news of Sir Alec Mac- 
Nairne and “Wilhelmina.” But he had learned nothing; and 
we had to console each other by saying that “no news is good 
news.” There’s a chance, of course, of running across him 
again in Zeeland : but it’s only one in ten, for there are other 
places where he is more likely to be pursuing us, since he lost 
the trail in Leeu warden. Or perhaps he has given up the idea 
that Aunt Fay is on Rudolph Brederode’s boat, and has gone 
to search for her in some other less watery country. In any 
case, the trip will be over in a few days now; and once the 
L.C.P. has vanished with Tibe into the vast obscurity whence 
she emerged in answer to my advertisement, poor hot-tem- 
pered Alec may pounce upon me when he likes. 

If I can persuade Nell that she and I were born for each 
other, as Robert seems without difficulty to have persuaded 


368 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Phyllis in his regard, it ought to be easy to convince her that 
a sin for her sake is no sin. Having confessed all, and been 
forgiven, I can defy Alec to do his worst. 

As for Alb, he has had his fun for his wages. And there 
are many beautiful girls in Holland and other countries, who 
ask nothing better than to become Jonkheeresses. 


XXXIV 


R OBERT came on board with us as a matter of course 
in starting for Zeeland. Has he not more right than 
I to the deck of “Mascotte,” as the cousin of the 
owner and the fiance of her stepsister ? He and 
Phyllis were the only ones among us who had the same air of 
cheerful, light-hearted anticipation at setting off for new 
scenes, which all used to have when the trip was but a few 
days old. For them there is no thought of any end, since the 
tour of life together is just beginning, full petrol ahead. 

Even when she was “Lorelei,” and had no concealments 
from the world, “Mascotte” never sped more bravely. Through 
the wide Noord Canal she took us as unconcernedly as if our 
hopes and fears for the future were nothing to her. Out of 
sheer spite at her lack of sympathy, I enjoyed my private 
knowledge that, whatever happens to her, she is certain to 
lose her companion, “Waterspin.” But she didn’t know that; 
so she jogged on, purring, in blissful ignorance of the separa- 
tion in store for her. 

If Dordrecht had come under our eyes when they were 
fresh to Dutch waterways, we could not have passed it. Even 
now, blase with sight-seeing, and preoccupied with private 
heartburnings, it seemed rather like passing Venice without 
troubling to stop; for Dordrecht appeared to me more rem- 
iniscent of Venice than any other place seen during the 
trip. 

So attractive did it look, as we peered up its pink-and- 
green canals, that I did suggest pausing. 

“It would give us one more day together,” I said, “if we 
369 


370 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

took this for exploring Dordrecht and arrived at Middelburg 

to-morrow. Why are we in a hurry ?” 

Brederode laughed. “Ask Robert,” he said. 

But Robert’s face and Phyllis’s both answered before the 
question could be put. I guessed that Robert would have liked 
to stop the tour at Rotterdam (for what to him are the joys of 
traveling with a party compared to the bliss of the honey- 
moon ?), but that Phyllis would not cheat Nell of Zeeland, 
which has always been talked of as the climax of the trip; 
Zeeland the mysterious, Zeeland the strange, proud daughter 
of the sea. 

“Some time we shall meet again, for you must all join in 
paying a visit to Phyllis and me. Then we will take you to 
Dordrecht, and we will all speak together of this day,” said 
Robert. 

That settled it, for though Nell is owner of the boat and 
mistress of the situation, she would do nothing to postpone 
Phyllis’s happiness. Something of the sort she murmured to 
me as we puffed past Dordrecht; but I could see by her face 
that Phyllis’s idea of happiness is not hers. 

“Good excuse to get in my entering wedge,” I thought. 
“Ask her if she doesn’t think it a risk for a girl to marry 
anybody but one of her own countrymen. If she says ‘yes,’ 
there’s my chance. If she’s inclined to argue, try to convince 
her, with our case in point.” 

No sooner, however, had I got my blue-serge shoulder 
closer to her white serge shoulder, as we both leaned over the 
rail, looking back toward the old town founded by great 
Count Dietrich, than up sidled the lady who sometimes over- 
estimates her duties as chaperon. She wanted to know about 
Dordrecht and John of Brabant and the siege, and the inun- 
dation that set the town upon an island; nor would she be 
discouraged when I told her flatly that I knew nothing about 
it, and advised application to Baedeker. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 371 

She lingered, prattling pleasantly of the Merevede, and of 
the peace and watery silence into which we had passed, now 
that Dordrecht was left behind. She drew Tibe’s attention to 
the low-skimming gulls, and our attention to Tibe. She asked 
if we did not smell salt, and insisted on our sniffing actively 
to make sure; then cried, “I told you so !” when, after slipping 
under a huge railway-bridge, hanging so high that the train 
upon it looked like a child’s toy, we turned westward and 
floated out upon a wide arm of the sea. 

Altogether, she would not let us forget her presence for 
a moment, and blandly refused to understand when my 
raised eyebrows telegraphed, “I didn’t hire you for this.” 

We seemed now to have said good-by to the sheltered 
coziness of Holland, just as we had said good-by to several 
other pleasant dreams of the past. On either side the land 
ran away from us and hid beneath the dancing waves which 
ruffled the sea’s sleeve, so that we saw of it only long stripes of 
green, which were great dykes, and irregular f riflings of red, 
which were steeples and tiled roofs of houses. 

The tide was in our favor, and we moved so quickly that 
Alb thought we would have no difficulty in reaching Middel- 
burg by nightfall. Large steamers passed us, their decks piled 
with cargo, passengers crowding to the side to stare curiously 
down upon us as we rocked coquettishly in their wash. Save 
for these big floating houses, and broad bowed, coughing 
motor-barges, “Mascotte” and “Waterspin” had the wide 
waterway to themselves; and when we had taken a southerly 
course, to enter a channel between low-lying islands, we were 
in Zeeland. Still, though we were skirting the shore of the is- 
land of Schouwen, it was as if it ducked its head rather than 
submit to the ignominy of being seen by strangers. It was just 
as Alb said, “Zeeland was witch-like, illusive, with the power 
of making herself invisible.” The endless, straight lines of 
the dykes protecting Schouwen and Tholen from the terrible 


372 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

power of the sea, stretched like close-drawn ranks of devoted 
soldiers — each stone a knight in armor — defending their 
liege ladies from an invading giant, hiding the besieged dam- 
sels’ beauty behind their shields, so that the monster’s appe- 
tite might not be whetted by their charms. 

Schouwen on the one hand, Tholen on the other, seemed 
to fall apart as Brederode cast us upon the broad bosom of the 
Oster Scheldt, steering for North Beveland, and told us le- 
gends the while of that strange archipelago which has for its 
arms a lion swimming in deep waters. He told of the yellow- 
haired Siren, who would sing to lure sailors to her rock be- 
cause she was bored by the society of the Merman, her hus- 
band; how some fisherman one night caught her in a net, and, 
because she was beautiful, would not give her back to the Mer- 
man, though he begged and prayed, offering a rich bribe of 
pearls and coral ; how the Merman swam away at last, cursing 
the fishermen and their country, vowing never to rest till he 
and his brothers, with their own hands, had brought enough 
sand to choke all the city ports. 

He told, too, of the tempests which throw on the shores of 
Zeeland’s little isles the bodies of strange mummied monsters, 
part man, part boat; and of still, clear dawnings when the 
fisherfolk of Domburg can discern, far down under the green 
water, pagan temples of marble, and gleaming statues more 
perfect than any fashioned by known sculptors, even the 
greatest masters, when Greek art was in its prime. He told 
of the great dyke building, and how, at high tide, the North 
Sea beats fiercely on Zeeland’s locked door. He told of the 
inundations, and how Schouwen, North and South Beveland, 
Tholen and Walcheren, had all been devoured by the sea, 
only to rise up again braver and stronger than before. He 
told how the men of Zeeland had fought against the men 
of Spain in the old, bad days; and it was all very interesting 
and instructive; but how was I to oppose my frail vow against 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 373 
such a tide of information ? There were no dykes built 
round my resolve to propose to Nell within the space of 
four and twenty hours; and between Alb’s eloquence and 
the L.C.P.’s persistence, it dissolved like a Dutch town in an 
inundation. 

Still I was not as furious as I ought to have been. My 
steeples and chimneys remained above water, and the sky was 
so cloudless that I could not despair. It seemed like old times 
to hear Alb holding forth upon the history, drama, and legend 
of the little country of which he is so proud, and in spite of 
myself my heart was warm for him. I rather wondered how 
Nell had contrived to harden hers so relentlessly against those 
clear brown features, those deep brown eyes, and the firm 
mouth which is not cold. 

“A good thing for me,” thought I, “that she has. And if 
I don’t get a chance to ask her to-day, I’ll write a note and beg 
the L.C.P. — no, I’ll get Sister Phyllis to give it to her this 
evening.” 

I was arranging the wording of the note, after tea, which 
we had on deck, when, quite idly at first, my eyes dwelt upon 
a black speck moving far away, in our wake. It amused me 
to see the speck grow, for at the moment I had no one to talk 
to, and Tibe was asleep with his chin on my knee. I lost track 
of a sentence which was shaping itself nicely in my mind and 
ought to have been irresistible to Nell, in wondering what the 
speck would turn out to be, by-and-by. 

It was growing fast, which meant that it was moving fast, 
perhaps faster than we. Could it be a motor-barge ? But why 
should a motor-barge be forging out to sea, where no motor- 
barges or motor-boats of any sort, except racers, had any need 
to venture, unless they were navigated to gratify the whim of a 
wilful American girl ? 

Now, it did not appear likely that in Dutch waters there 
could be at this moment an indefinite number of American 


374 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

girls, wilful or otherwise, owning motor- vessels, and wishing 

to visit Zeeland in them. 

If it were not such a fine day, Alb would not have taken 
the risk with “Mascotte” and “Waterspin,” even to please his 
particular American girl, and if it were not to please her, he 
would probably not have come in any case. Yet that thing be- 
hind us was skimming along too fast to be anything else save a 
motor-boat. What then was its errand in this wide, lake-like 
expanse of water, which did not lend itself to the encourage- 
ment of promiscuous motor-boats ? 

It was gaining on us now, for it had no fat “Waterspin” to 
drag. One might almost think it was following, it came so 
straight, and — Suddenly my ears and the top of my head 
felt hot. 

I got up, and went to Alb, who was standing silent at the 
wheel. Before I spoke to him I glanced at the others to see 
that they were all fully occupied in listening to Robert talk 
of the house, next door to his mother’s in Rotterdam, which 
he had the intention of buying “as a wedding present for 
Phyllis.” 

“Alb,” said I, “just throw a look over your shoulder, and 
say what manner of thing you think that is coming after us.” 

He threw the look. “I think,” he answered slowly, “that 
it’s by way of being Sir Alec MacNairne’s ‘ Wilhelmina.’ ” 

“Good heavens!” I exclaimed, “you take it pretty calmly.” 
But even as I reproached him, I was conscious of an increase 
of speed. Alb can regulate this by means of a long lever which 
goes down through the deck to the motor. 

“What makes you think it’s Sir Alec ?” I asked. “You can’t 
tell yet what the thing looks like.” 

“Neither can you,” said Alb. “You felt what it was. It’s 
the same with me. I feel it’s ‘ Wilhelmina,’ and I’m going to 
try and give her the slip again, if I can. But honestly, if it’s 
she, and she wants to overhaul us, we haven’t got much chance 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 375 
weighted down by ‘Waterspin.’ If it weren’t for that, I’d 
guarantee to let ‘Wilhelmina’ see nothing but our heels.” 

“Let’s cut ‘Waterspin’ adrift,” I whispered, glaring at poor 
Toon, who stood steering the squat little barge, with an irri- 
tatingly complacent look on his nice face. 

“Impossible, my dear fellow. But you don’t mean it, of 
course.” 

“I’m capable of meaning anything,” said I. “See here, 
old Alb, you’ve pulled me through a lot of things, since you 
tied yourself round my neck; pull me through this, and you 
shall be best man at my wedding.” 

“WTio’ll be the bride ?” he asked, as I stared back at the 
following craft, which was now too big to be called a speck. 
It was a black blot upon the water, as upon my hopes. 

“The bride ?” I repeated. “Why, N — Oh, by Jove ! wasn’t 
she the one you wanted at one time ? You never would tell 
which, you know, so you can’t blame me.” 

“Are you engaged to her ?” he asked, in rather a queer 
voice; and I realized how much I was at his mercy, as, fas- 
cinated, I watched his brown hand tighten on the wheel. 
If he liked, he could stop “Mascotte” in mid sea, and let me 
lie at the mercy of the enemy. I could no nothing. Hendrik 
would obey him, not me. Even Tibe would not seize him by 
the throat to please me. Tibe likes and respects Alb even more, 
strange to say, than he does me. 

But, to do Alb justice, he was not slowing down. On the 
contrary, he was putting on speed, as much, I feared, as “Mas- 
cotte” was capable of making. 

“I’m not engaged,” I admitted; “but I was going to pro- 
pose to her to-day, if this hadn’t happened. For goodness’ 
sake, hurry.” 

“I wonder you have the cheek to tell me that, and then 
ask me to hurry. Why should I help you to get her ?” 

“Do you still want her ?” I asked. 


376 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“More than I ever wanted or shall want anything else.” 

“Then it’s all up with me !” I groaned. 

“Do you mean ” 

“I only mean that you can make me lose her. If Alec Mac- 
Nairne boards us like a pirate, and yells for his Fay, I shall 
be discovered as a perjured villain, just in the very hour when 
it’s necessary for me to appear most virtuous. Heavens ! If 
this could only have happened afterwards. Once I was sure 
of her, I’d have confessed everything, for I could have made 
her understand how it was all done for her sake — for love 
of her.” 

“And her stepsister,” said Alb, bitterly, as he did to the 
wheel what perhaps he would have liked to do to my throat. 

“That was a mere boyish fancy,” said I. “I love Nell Van 
Buren with a man’s love. You can stop this boat if you choose 
to be a revengeful Albatross ” 

“I shall not stop the boat,” he said, in a grave, hard voice, 
which made my tone sound light, almost humorous. “I shall 
not rob you of your chance with her. If it depends upon me, 
you shall have it.” 

I really did admire Alb, as he stood there, not looking at 
me, but straight' ahead, as if into a blank future. 

“Do you care for her a lot ?” I asked, half remorsefully. 

“Only more than for the rest of the world put together. 
But I tell you honestly, I haven’t had much hope lately. I 
suppose I was a conceited ass to make up my mind that 
nothing should stop me from winning the girl, in spite of her- 
self. Well, she’s punished me — shown me my folly. But for 
all that, I regret nothing. If it were to do over again, I’d come 
on board this boat and work for her as I have worked, even 
knowing as I know now that she’d end by disliking me as 
much as she did in the beginning. You’re an attractive fellow 
to women, Starr.” 

“Phyllis preferred Robert,” I said thoughtfully. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 377 

“Yes. I confess I hoped you and Miss Rivers would make 
a match: then I’d have had nothing to fear from you in the 
other direction. But it wasn’t to be; and she and Bob van 
Buren will be perfectly happy. You needn’t fear I’ll turn 
against you. Depend on me to do my best with the boat — 
though of course you won’t expect help in any other way.” 

“Of course not,” I said. 

“Nor need it, I suppose,” he added, harshly. 

“Perhaps we may be mistaken about the boat being Alec’s,” 
I said. 

“We both know we’re not,” said he. “Still — there’s my 
glass. Have a squint through it.” 

I took up the binocular which the skipper always Keeps 
handy, and had the squint, as he recommended. It was not an 
encouraging squint, for, though our follower had not been 
gaining for the last few minutes, all I could see of her made 
me more confident than before that she was “Wilhelmina.” 
Whether Alec MacNairne was actually in chase of us, or 
whether it merely happened that he had to-day made up his 
mind to try Zeeland, in his quest, remained to be seen; but 
be that as it might, we were in the greatest danger of being 
overtaken. 

In my agitation and fear of losing all, l could not concen- 
trate my mind upon the thinking out of any stratagem to 
outwit Alec if he came upon us, and I dared not interrupt Alb’s 
task by imploring him to rack his brains. The thing for him 
to do, I told myself, was to keep ahead of “Wilhelmina” at any 
price, especially while we were in open water. Once we could 
gain the region of canals and narrow cross channels, we might 
slip round a water-corner and disappear. Anything, anything, 
then, to keep ahead ! 

“Run down and tell Hendrik to see that there’s plenty of 
water,” said Alb. “It won’t do for the motor to get hot. Say 
to him that we’re going to have a race.” 


378 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I can’t make him understand,” I wailed. 

“I forgot. Well, take the wheel a minute, then ” 

“I daren’t. If I do, something’s sure to go wrong; or I 
shall snap it short off on its stem. ” 

“You are a helpless chap, I must say.” 

“So would you be, if I told you to finish one of my pictures, 
perhaps.” 

“That’s true. Well, say this.” 

And he uttered useless-sounding words in Dutch, which 
I repeated after him until I knew them by heart. Then I went 
below and gabbled them to Hendrik, not more than half 
wrong, for he seemed to understand. But while the pink 
youth abandoned the operation of rubbing brass with cotton 
waste in favor of bailing up water, I stood gazing at the motor, 
praying it to do its best. 

It was hot in the motor’s den; so hot that it was no wonder 
the deck, which formed the roof, often felt warm underfoot. 
Chump, chump, went the engine, sounding stolid and Dutch 
and obstinate, as if nothing on earth or water could induce it 
to go faster than it chose. It even seemed to me as I gazed 
that it was slowing down, out of spite. I longed to feel its 
pulses with a stop-watch in the other hand, and make sure. 
Could it be that, after all, Alb had changed his mind, and 
meant to betray me ? No, it must be a trick of my amateurish 
fancy. 

I assured myself of this two or three times over; but when 
Hendrik came back with a big pail of water, I saw by his face 
that I had not been deceived. Something was wrong. 

There was no use in trying to question him, since I have 
no Dutch, and he has no English, except “Thank you,” and 
“Good day.” He flew at the motor, his cheeks pinker than 
ever, and I flew up on deck to find Alb in the act of giving 
over the wheel to Nell. 

He pushed past me with a quick, “Don’t stop me. I’ve got 


r " RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 379 
to see what’s wrong.” And I joined Nell, who looked very 
proud of herself as skipper. 

Every one on deck was alert now, knowing that something 
had happened, for the first time in all our peaceful watery 
weeks. They were not yet aware of the pirate in pursuit, or 
that this day was the one of all others when the motor ought 
not to fail us : but they knew that, after putting on a fine spurt 
of speed for some reason or other, the engine had turned 
suddenly sulky, and was threatening to stop. 

“Have I the evil eye ?” I asked myself. “Did I ‘overlook’ 
the beastly thing when I went below and stared at it ?” 

“What’s the matter ?” I inquired of Nell, feeling a cer- 
tain relief in talking to her, she looked so beautiful and so 
dependable 

“Don’t speak to the man at the wheel,” she said, smiling, 
but keeping her eyes straight ahead. 

“Jonkheer Brederode says it’s nothing serious; we aren’t to 
worry,” remarked the L.C.P. from her deck-chair. “I think 
it’s rather fun to have a nice little accident. It breaks the 
monotony. And it’s really exciting, being out at sea.” 

“It is rather exciting,” said I, signaling danger, with a 
glance that swept the water as far back as the now plainly 
visible pursuer. 

She may or may not have caught my meaning; but Robert 
van Buren’s eyes chanced at that instant to fall upon the dis- 
tant craft. 

“Ah!” he observed, in a tone of careless interest, for which 
I could have boxed his ears, “there is another motor-boat, I 
believe. It is coming as straight as if it were following us.” 

I saw the L.C.P. give a start. She looked at me, and our 
eyes would have met had it not been for the blue glasses. She 
understood, and knew just how exciting her “nice little ac- 
cident” might turn out to be. 

At this moment the motor gave a groan and stopped. As 


380 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

it’s heart ceased to beat, I was astounded by the apparition of 

a totally new Alb. 

Two minutes ago, at most, he had disappeared in the garb 
of a self-respecting gentleman with a yachting turn of mind. 
He reappeared in a suit of Hendrik’s blue overalls, and, ap- 
parently, nothing else, his feet being bare. In his hand were a 
hammer and a chisel. 

“Motor’s all right. It must be the propeller that’s wrong. 
I’m going down to see,” he explained, no trace of excitement 
on his face, no hint of flurry in his voice. Alb is a good plucked 
one, and for presence of mind and savoir faire I’ve never met 
his equal. 

As “Mascotte” had slowed down, and then stopped, “Wat- 
erspin” came lolloping alongside. Toon, looking scarcely 
more flustered than his superior, kept the barge from bunting 
into her consort, fending her off with a pole. Alb, with a rope 
round his waist to keep him steady at his work under the 
water, slid over the side of the boat, and groped about with his 
free hand under the water-line. 

“There’s something round the screw shaft,” he called up to 
Robert and me. “Queer thing! It feels like a coil of wire. 
We must have picked it up in the canal by Dordrecht, and 
ever since it’s been slowly winding itself round the shaft, 
until now it’s so tight that the propeller can’t work. ” 

“Then all hope’s over,” I said, with a meaning which he 
alone — or perhaps the L.C.P. — could understand. “We’re 
caught in a trap.” 

“This hammer and chisel will gnaw our way out,” he an- 
swered. “The game isn’t up yet. Good-by. I’ve got to work 
in Davy Jones’s workshop.” 

Drawing a deep breath, he dropped down under water, 
which hid him from sight like a roof of thick gray glass. Then, 
in a few seconds, we heard a knocking, muffled, mysterious, 
somewhere below that glass roof. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 381 

After a time which seemed long to every one, and an age to 
me, up came Alb’s head, wet, black, and glittering. 

“Wish I had a diver’s helmet, ” he said, when he had breath- 
ed ; and promptly dipped out of sight again. 

Once more the knocking came. Alb was working hard 
and loyally for my interests, and against his own, I couldn’t 
help remembering; but meanwhile we were floating idly, 
losing precious time, while the pirate gained upon us. Fifteen 
minutes more of this inaction, and he would be on our backs. 
I almost wished that he were a true pirate, and that it might be 
a war of knives and cutlasses, instead of wits and tongues. 
I could be brave enough then; but as a fraudulent nephew 
detected with his false aunt, so to speak, in his mouth, what 
wonder if I felt my heart turn to water ? 

Twice more Alb came up to breathe, and dived again. 
The last time all was still underneath the water, and a fear 
came over me that Alb had knocked his head against some- 
thing, or got a cramp. But he appeared, spluttering, and 
announced that he had been cutting the wire through with the 
chisel. There it w^as in his hand, a thick, ugly coil, dangerous 
as an octopus. 

“Start the motor, Hendrik,” he called, even before he had 
clambered on deck. “Now, ladies, unless you go below you 
may get a shower bath, for we’re going to have a race with the 
motor-boat that’s coming along — just for the fun of the 
thing, you know — and I can’t trust the wheel to any one 
while I run down and change. ” 

“We shan’t mind a wetting,” said Nell, whose eyes were 
shining with something very like admiration. “We want to see 
the race. ” 

“I would rather you saw it from the cabin windows,” said 
Brederode; and I guessed at once that he had more than 
one object in hustling the women of the party below. The 
L.C.P. guessed alro, and headed a reluctant procession. 


382 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

Now the pursuing Vengeance was not five hundred yards 
behind, and if we had ever doubted that she was “Wilhel- 
mina,” we doubted no longer. I could distinctly see a man’s 
figure in the bow, and would have felt safe in staking any sum 
that it was Sir Alec’s. 

Alb, dripping like a fountain-statue, stood at the wheel, 
and as I had never seen him look more attractive, perhaps 
it was as well for me that Nell had gone below. 

“They’ll think me a madman when we come to a lock,” 
said he; “but who cares ? I’m bound to get you out of this 
scrape if lean.” 

Never was sound more melodious in my ears than the 
quickening throb of the motor. I felt intimate and at home 
with it, as with the beating of my own heart. On we went, 
pounding along at recovered speed, and were well into the 
channel between North and South Beveland, but there also 
was “Wilhelmina.” Oh, for some small side canal into which 
we could slip and somehow disappear ! 

As my eyes searched the waste of green water and the low 
coasts of Beveland, all unexpectedly to me we rounded a 
point, and there was a half-hidden town, one graceful spire 
seeming to beckon where safety lay. 

“It’s Veere,” said Alb. “You’re sure to have heard of it : all 
artists have. But the thing of importance to us now is the 
canal which begins here, crosses the island of Walcheren and 
goes to Middelburg and Vlissingen. If only we can get in, 
and shut ‘Wilhelmina’ out !” 

“Can we ?” I gasped. 

“Look !” he answered. “What luck !” 

I looked, and saw from afar two great sea-gates of a mon- 
ster lock standing open, while into its jaws poured a train of 
barges, sailing-boats and small steamers, which had been 
biding their time outside. 

“Joy !” I cried. “We’re saved. ” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 383 

“Not yet,” said Alb, as we dashed on, full speed ahead, 
going as we had never gone yet. “We may be too late. Quick, 
run for’rad, haul down the stars and stripes, and hoist the 
Club flag instead. That’ll carry more power even than the 
whole Navy of the United States, and I mean to use it for all 
it’s worth, right or no right.” 

I darted to the bow and changed the flags, fumbling in my 
haste; then, when the talisman was floating bravely, I hurried 
back to Alb, who was imperiously clanging our bell with one 
hand, and steering with the other. 

I stood ready with the long boat-hook, not daring to look 
back and see what speed “Wilhelmina” might be making. 
Toon was alert on “Waterspin,” with a coiled rope in his 
hand. All the boats were in the lock now, and the sound of our 
bell, and the colors of the Club flag alone kept the lock-keeper 
from closing the great gate-jaws. Time was up: we must make 
a spurt for it if we were not to exhaust his patience. We could 
see him beckoning eagerly, and with a rush we were at the 
gates, in the tail of the long procession. It was only as I knew 
they were slowly, inexorably closing behind us that I could 
bring myself to look back. There was “Wilhelmina” just 
coming into sight round the point, Alec MacNairne gesticu- 
lating wildly, a figurehead “come alive,” and furious. 


XXXV 


G 


RE AT Scott, but that was a narrow shave!” I 
sighed in ecstasy. “He’s out of it now.” 

“He may be out of the lock, but we’re not out 
of the wood,” said Alb. 

He had slowed down, reversed the engine, and quietly 
passed into a water-lane between some huge barges, looking 
not a whit disconcerted by the curious gaze of the barge-folk 
who wondered at his bare feet and soaked overalls. 

“Why, what can he do ?” I asked. “He’ll have to wait an 
hour before the lock opens again.” 

“You’ll see presently what he can do,” said Alb. “At least, 
you will if he has any sense. It will be time for us to crow by- 
and-by — if ever. ” 

I burned to ask what he meant by these ominous prognos- 
tications; but he began to jabber in Dutch to our staring 
water-neighbors. Any stranger would have thought him in the 
pleasantest mood in the world. He had a friendly nod for the 
brown-faced skipper of a smoking tug, a few words for an- 
other, and smiles for every one. 

“I’m telling them that I’ve a wager on, and begging their 
kind help to win it,” he explained to me, as gradually he push- 
ed “Mascotte” and “Waterspin” through, and ahead of, the 
other craft. “I’m saying nothing about the Club flag; but they 
can see it, and they all know what it means. But, to save rows, 
I’m being extra polite, and, you see, it pays. Nobody yet has 
resented our getting ahead, though theirs is the right of 
precedence.” 

On we went toward the top of the lock, sneaking, sidling, 
384 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 385 
pushing, here and there thanks to a good-natured, helping 
hand, here and there thanks to a shout from the lock-keeper 
to a sulky bargeman. On the lock-keeper the sight of the Club 
flag had a magic effect, and he evidently intended to make its 
rights respected, no doubt counting on a five gulden “tip” 
at the end. 

Ignorant of the perils at which Alb had hinted, the time 
seemed intolerably long as the water foamed in through the 
upper sluice-gates, filling the lock inch by inch, and lifting its 
load of creaking boats and tugs. When we entered the lower 
gates, we could see only the green and slimy wall of the lock; 
but by-and-by we found ourselves looking over green fields to 
a picturesque old town no more than a stone’s throw away. 

Alb’s pleasantries and the might of the Club flag had 
brought us near to the top of the lock, and I had begun to 
hope that his dark prophecies were not to be fulfilled, when I 
jumped at the sound of a shout from shore. 

The voice was the voice of Alec MacNairne, and turning 
my head with a start, I saw his tall figure tearing toward us on 
the narrow parapet made by the edge of the lock. 

“That’s what you meant ?” I quavered. 

“That’s what I meant,” answered Alb. But his hand was 
on the starting lever, and the upper gates had begun to swing 
back. 

Alb was looking particularly debonair, and taking pattern 
by him, I turned away from my aunt’s husband, pretending 
that I had neither seen nor heard him. 

“Hi, you there ! Starr — Brederode ! Scoundrels !” he roared 
at our backs. 

“If he jumps into one of these boats and gets across to 
us !” I murmured. 

“He will if he can, but ” 

Before Alb could finish his sentence the first half of my 
fear was verified. Sir Alec gathered himself for a spring, and 


386 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

leaping across the narrow water-lane between his parapet and 

the nearest barge, landed with a crash on the gunwale. 

At that sound my heart seemed to stop for repairs; for 
there were two barges in front of us, the biggest in the lock, 
and we had not been able to pass them before the doors be- 
gan to open. Now we could not escape until they ha.d floated 
out into the canal, and, meanwhile, there might be a little 
private tragedy in high life on board “Mascotte.” 

But a Dutchman’s lighter is as sacred, Alb has explained 
to us all, as a Dutchman’s house; and when the loud, Explo- 
sive Scotsman arrived on the gunwale, uninvited and breath- 
ing fire, the. lighter’s owner proceeded also to breathe fire. 
He swore; his Ixees dog yapped; his children cried and his 
wife vituperated. An understudy took the helm, and before 
Sir Alec could jump across to another barge, in his pursuit 
of us, he foun,d himself engaged in an encounter with the 
skipper of his first choice. 

The one could speak no English, the other could speak no 
Dutch; and in his fury at seeing us slip out through the gates 
behind the two great barges, he could do nothing but stammer 
with rage, and try to push past the stout form which strove to 
detain him for argument. 

Naturally, the push made matters worse. Sir Alec does 
not know Dutchmen, especially lightermen, as well as I have 
learned to do, or he would have refrained from that extreme — 
and on the man’s own barge. His push was given back with 
interest, and the last we saw of him, as other boats surged 
round the scene of the contest, was in a gallant attempt to 
make a twelve-foot jump, while a stout Dutch skipper and a 
stout Dutch skipper’s stout Dutch wife held on to his coat-tails. 

Again I drew a full breath of relief, and I saw by Alb’s face 
that he, too, hoped for the best, for — whatever his private 
feelings might be — he is too good a sportsman not to feel the 
spirit of a race. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 387 

We were out of the lock, our propeller churning the water, 
but — again there was a “but.” Alb made a dash for freedom 
by trying to glide between the two immense barges which, 
alone of all the late denizens of the lock, had refused to give us 
precedence. But his gracious ways had not softened the hearts 
of these skippers, nor did they care for his Club flag. All they 
did care for was to keep one another from getting ahead. 

Evidently they were old enemies, and this was not the first 
time that they had engaged in deadly duel. Ancient scores 
had to be paid, and a fig for those who came after ! 

Each glared at the other. Each tried to push his big craft 
ahead. Crash ! They stuck, and jammed, the man at the right, 
the man at the left, pushing with all his force with a giant pole, 
each push locking both barges the tighter. 

We were on their heels, and on ours was the whole press of 
boats let out from the lock, surging heavily forward. 

Alb shouted something in Dutch. “I’m saying that the 
only thing is for one to give way, and let the other go by in 
advance, not both try to strain through together,” he explain- 
ed, when I anxiously demanded to know what was happening. 

Both men shook their heads, and grumbled, while from 
behind rose a Babel of cries and adjurations. 

“They won’t,” said Alb. “They say that they will never give 
way to each other. They would smash their boats first. If 
anything happens to part them they won’t mind, because it 
will be fate, and neither one will have given up for the other. 
Meanwhile, they say they’re sorry, but they won’t move, and 
the rest of us must fare the best we can.” 

“Can’t the lock-keeper do anything ?” I asked. 

“He can swear.” Alb smiled; and I believe there was some- 
thing in him that sympathized with the two obstinate brutes. 

“For goodness’ sake tell them we’ll give each one a hun- 
dred — no, a thousand — gulden, if necessary, if only they’ll 
agree as to which is to yield, and move out of our road.” 


388 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I’ll tell them,” said Brederode, dubiously; and a few words 
passed between the three. 

“I knew what they’d answer,” he announced, in a moment. 
“They say they won’t do it for a million. ‘Every man has 
his price,’ is a proverb that doesn’t count with Dutchmen, 
where principles are concerned. Now, I’m going to try and 
force a way, but I’m afraid ‘Mascotte’ hasn’t force enough, 
and if not, it’s all up, for here comes MacNairne.” 

I looked back and saw my uncle-in-law picking his way 
toward us from boat to barge, from barge to lighter. He had 
lost his hat in that argument of which I had not seen the end, 
but he had not lost his determination, and at his present rate 
he would reach us in about two minutes. 

Suddenly Alb put on full speed ahead, and gallantly little 
“Mascotte” rammed her dainty nose between the two black 
and bulky barges. But her strength did not match her courage. 
She got only a pinching for her pains, and, as Alb exclaimed, 
we were caught. 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve done all I could, and don’t 
see what I can do more, short of knocking poor MacNairne on 
the head with a pole.” 

“You’ve been a brick, and I won’t forget it,” said I. A 
strange coolness had come upon me with the knowledge that 
the worst was inevitable. I felt that my small-sword alone 
could win me through. “All I ask is that, whatever I do or 
say, you’ll stand by me,” I finished. 

“Have you a plan ?” he asked. 

“Part of a plan. I ” 

Before I had a chance to finish either plan or sentence the 
enemy was upon us. I heard him coming, and turned round 
just in time to meet my aunt’s husband face to face as, climb- 
ing across from the nearest barge, he leaped over the rail on to 
our little deck. 


XXXVI 


I SMILED brilliantly at the dear fellow. I sprang to him, 
holding out a welcoming hand. 

“Why, Sir Alec, this is a delightful surprise!” I 
exclaimed. “Where did you come from ? I thought I 
had lost you, at Leeuwarden.” 

So utterly was he dumfounded, not to say flabbergasted, 
by the manner of his reception, that I had time to spring these 
three quickly following remarks upon him before he was able 
to answer. 

When he did, it was with a sledge-hammer. “Well, I’m 
d — d !” said he. 


I stared in gentle amazement; then, glancing quickly at 
Alb, appeared suddenly to apprehend his meaning. 

“Why, of course, you must be surprised to find me on a 
boat w ith Jonkheer Brederode.” 

“You lied to me at Leeuwarden,” went on Sir Alec. He 
was never a man to mince words, as I noticed when visiting 
my aunt. Poor, pretty, flirtatious Aunt Fay!” 

I now gathered dignity. My simple delight at an unex- 
pected meeting with a relative (in law) in a foreign waterway, 
froze into virtuous indignation. 

“Really, Sir Alec, I am at a loss to understand you,” I 
said. “I greet you in the most friendly ” 

“Because you’re a scoundrel and a hypocrite,” said he. 

This interruption I scorned to notice, save by proceeding 
as I had intended to proceed. 

“And you insult me. What do you mean, Sir Alec Mac- 
Nairne ?” 


389 


390 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I mean” — he caught me up without hesitation — “that 
you, though you pretended to sympathize when I confided in 
you, were in league with Rudolph Brederode to outwit and 
deceive me in the most shameless way.” 

“You forget yourself,” said Brederode, turning red, and 
contriving to keep his dignity in spite of Hendrik’s sopping 
overalls. “I have never deceived or injured you. If this were 
my bo.at, I should have to ask ” 

“Don’t try that on,” said Sir Alec, scornfully. “It is your 
boat.” 

“It happens to be the property of Miss Van Buren, a young 
American lady, for whom I’m acting as skipper,” returned 
Alb. 

“Rot,” was the terse comment of my uncle-in-law. 

Alb bit his lip, and his eyes were growing dangerous. I 
had seen that look on his face once or twice. 

“And he’s engaged to her,” said I. 

That is, something inside of me popped out those words, 
and there they were, spoken, not to be taken back. Alb and 
I looked at each other. He flushed again. But he did not speak. 

“Produce this Miss Van Buren,” sneered Sir Alec. 

“I will,” I promised. “But before I do, calm yourself. 
You are in no fit state to speak to ladies.” 

“I wish to talk to my wife,” said he. 

“Aunt Fay is not on board this boat, and never has been,” 
I pronounced, each nerve on edge lest one lovely feminine 
head or another should pop up from below. I knew well that 
we owed the extraordinary obedience of the girls to the mag- 
netic influence of that remarkable woman their chaperon, and 
how long she could continue to exert the charm which meshed 
them in the cabin, as Vivien meshed Merlin in the hollow oak, 
it was impossible to guess. At any instant we might hear a 
girlish voice calling the name of Lady MacNairne. Even if 
Tibe — but I dared not think of Tibe. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 391 

Horatius holding his bridge alone, was nothing compared 
to me. No one could help me now. 

“Pooh ! Do you expect me to believe that ? After what hap- 
pened at Leeuwarden — when I trusted you ?” 

“You trusted me,” said I, coldly, “with good reason, and 
it would be well if you did so again. Kindly state what, from 
your point of view, did happen at Leeuw^arden to bring this 
storm of unmerited abuse upon my head.” 

“I dare say it would be convenient to you to forget. I 
met you with Brederode at the Kermess. You seized me and 
prevented me from following him as I wished to do. Then, 
when he had got out of my way, you assured me that you’d 
find him. You said you were not with him on his boat, that you 
hadn’t been together ten minutes ” 

“Neither had we,” said I. “That was perfectly true. And 
I’m npt on his boat. As he told you, I’m on Miss Van Buren’s. 
And if I didn’t look you up to tell you where you could find 
Jonkheer Brederode, it was because I thought you would only 
lose your dignity by meeting him, and do Aunt Fay and your- 
self both more harm than good. I know for a certainty that 
Alb — that Brederode hasn’t seen Aunt Fay since July any- 
how. And why should I let you and your stupid suspicions 
make trouble between a very good fellow and — and — the 
girl he’s in love with ?” 

This time I did not meet Alb’s eyes. I was looking straight 
and with a noble defiance into Sir Alec’s. 

“You are very high and mighty,” said he. “But I’m not 
to be fooled again by either of you. I’ve been chasing Brede- 
rode for weeks in that beastly motor-launch, and I’m about 
sick of the whole business. I’ve got him now, and you, too. 
And though you may both tell me till you’re blue in the face 
that my wife hasn’t been and isn’t on this boat, I won’t be- 
lieve you till I’ve searched every hole and corner of it.” 

“Perhaps I had better go and ask Miss Van Buren whether 


392 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

she will kindly permit my uncle-in-law to make such an ex- 
amination of her property,” I said, with the ice of conscious 
rectitude in my voice. 

“Very well,” returned Sir Alec. “Go and fetch her.” 

With head aloft, I stalked to the top of the steps which I 
defy any human being to descend with dignity. 

What would happen between Sir Alec and Alb while I was 
gone, or what I should say when I got below, I knew not. I 
could only trust to luck. Was it going to turn out in vain, 
I asked myself, that all my life I have been called “lucky 
Starr” ? 

| The canvas curtain at the door of the outer cabin, which 
protects the ladies from the heat of the motor-room, was un- 
furled and hanging at length. Standing behind it, I spoke Miss 
Van Buren’s name. 

j All was silent on the other side. But, after a delay of a few’ 
seconds, Nell half pushed aside the heavy folds of canvas 
and looked out at me. Her charming face was, for an instant, 
I within twelve inches of mine. I drew back in resignation. 
With my own hand I had given her to another. Whether or 
no she would eventually become his, I could not tell, but I 
felt that, after what I had done, she would never belong to me. 

There was, however, very little time to think of that now. 
My business was pressing. 

“Come outside in the passage a minute,” I said, in a low 
voice, still hearing no sound from the other side of the curtain. 
“I want to speak to you.” 

“Lady MacNairne ” she began. 

I put my finger to my lips. “Sh !” said I. 

“Oh, did you know she was ill ?” asked Nell. 

I shook my head. 

“She is, poor dear. She had the most sudden attack, just 
after we came down, and Phyllis and I haven’t been able to 
leave her. She wouldn’t let one of us go up to tell you.” 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 393 

“Wonderful little woman!” I could scarcely refrain from 
exclaiming. “Her cleverness — I mean her consideration — 
is extraordinary.” 

“It was her heart,” explained Nell. “She’s been lying 
down ever since, holding Phyllis’s hand and mine. But she’s 
better now, and I’m not sure she hasn’t gone to sleep, for when 
I heard you call me, and tried to slip my hand out of hers, she 
didn’t seem to notice.” 

“She wouldn’t,” I said — to myself. “Where’s Tibe ?” I 
asked aloud. 

“She’s using him for a footstool.” 

All accounted for and under control! Yes; thrice wonder- 
ful little woman. 

“We couldn’t see anything of the race after all,” went on 
Nell. “Did we beat ?” 

“That’s what I’ve come to talk to you about,” I said, not 
knowing in the least what I was going to say next. “It turned 
out,” I went on slowly, “that a man I — er — know, was on 
board the boat we were racing. We beat it, but we didn’t beat 
him; for he’s walked on board since we’ve been jammed by a 
couple of brutes on barges. Oh, no harm done — don’t be 
worried. The man is — in fact — Sir Alec MacNairne.” 

“Oh, the nice man we met at Amsterdam, and again at 
Leeu warden, when we — we — ” She blushed at the recollec- 
tion. “He’s a distant relation of ” 

“Hush! Please don’t speak her name or his loud enough 
for either to hear,” I whispered. “I can’t explain all to you; 
but — will you trust me ?” 

“Why, of course,” said my lost Angel. 

“Sir Alec MacNairne thinks his wife is on board, and he’s 
very angry w T ith Brederode and me, because, you see, he and 
his wife have had a quarrel,” I vaguely explained. “He’s got 
everything mixed up; and because he’s heard that a Lady 
MacNairne’s on this boat, he’s been chasing us, full of fury. 


394 THE BOTOR CHAPERON J 

He’s silly enough to believe that Brederode’s in love with his 
wife, and — I can’t make you understand precisely why, with- 
out giving away a secret of my aunt's - — that nonsense of his is 
likely to work our Lady MacNairne a lot of harm.” 

“What a shame!” exclaimed sympathetic but puzzled Nell. 
“Can’t anything be done about it ?” 

“Something has been done,” said I. “That’s what I want 
you to forgive me for, and — and help me to carry out, for 
Aunt Fay’s sake. Poor Aunt Fay, who’s suffering with her 
heart at this minute! What will she have to endure, if you 
don’t stand by her !” 

“I’ll stand by her with all my might and main,” said Nell. 
“What can I do?” 

“I’m breaking it to you — by degrees. The first degree is, 
I told Sir Alec that Alb was — is — in love with you.” 

“Oh — how could you ?” 

“It was fatally easy. And then I said you were engaged 
to him. That’s the second degree; and the third and last is, 
that I beg and implore you to come on deck with me, and tell 
him it’s true.” 

The girl had actually turned pale. “I can’t possibly. Any- 
thing else — but not that,” she said. 

“It’s the one thing to save my poor aunt. Miss Van Buren 
— Nell — I tell you frankly, if you won’t do this, she — I’m 
afraid she won’t much longer be Lady MacNairne.” 

“Good gracious ! How awful !” stammered the girl. 

“Tragic!” I agreed. “And for me — but I say nothing of 
my feelings. You know how devoted I am to my aunt. She’ll 
be alone in the world — with Tibe — if you refuse to sacrifice 
yourself in this way for her.” 

Nell’s face was now white and set. I felt a brute; but what 
was I to do ? For the sake of every one concerned, I couldn’t 
have the L.C.P. exposed, or be exposed myself, and the trip 
broken up at the last, in contumely for all. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 395 

I hung on her lips. 

“Where is Jonkheer Brederode ?” she asked. 

“He’s on deck, too. ” 

“And you expect me to say — before him — that ” 

“He’s said the same, already. Or, at least, he agreed while I 
said it.” 

“Oh ! Well, I don’t see how I’m to go through with it. But 
for Lady MacNairne’s sake, I’ll — do it. Come, let’s get it over.” 

“Wait a minute,” I urged, restraining her impatience. “I 
must explain a little more, first. After Sir Alec has talked 
with you, he’ll want to come below to the cabins, and every- 
where, searching for his wife; for he won’t believe, till he’s 
made sure with his own eyes, that she’s not on board. If 
you’re wilKng that he should, I am; but don’t tell him that a 
person named Lady MacNairne’s really with us, or I can’t 
answer for the consequences.” 

“If he comes below, he’ll see her.” 

“That doesn’t matter, as they’ve never met; so long as he 
doesn’t know her name.” 

“Very well, he shan’t learn it from me.” 

“And he mustn’t from Miss Rivers. Will you warn your 
stepsister, not under any provocation whatever, to speak the 
name of Lady MacNairne’?” 

“I will. But why couldn’t you have said Phil was engaged 
to Jonkheer Brederode ?” 

“Robert van Buren wouldn’t have stood it.” 

“I see. But what about him ? It’s no use my telling him 
anything; he would go and do the opposite. Pie’s sitting in 
the outer cabin, alone, where Lady MacNairne asked him to 
stay and keep guard over her, while Phyllis and I stopped 
beside her in the inner room. 

“Dear Aunt Fay,” I murmured. “If you’ll just warn Miss 
Rivers, and tell my aunt that she’d better be asleep when Sir 
Alec MacNairne peeps in, I’ll tackle your cousin.” 


396 — < THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Come, then,” said Nell. 

And I followed her into that tasteful little cabin which, in 
the dim past, I decorated for my own use. 

Luckily, it is a far more difficult task to persuade Robert 
van Buren to say something than not to say anything at all; 
and though he was puzzled, and not too pleased at being 
plunged into a mystery, I extorted from him a promise to 
glare as much as he liked at the intruder but not on any ac- 
count to speak. 

“He won’t know you understand English,” I said, deter- 
mining to strengthen in Sir Alec’s mind, by every means in my 
power, the impression of Robert’s Dutchness. 

I had just arranged matters when Nell came back with the 
strained air of a martyr who hears the lions. We went up on 
deck together, and a glance showed Sir Alec that no intro- 
duction was needed. 

“What! This is Miss Van Buren, the young lady who is 
engaged to marry Jonkheer Brederode !” he exclaimed. 

Nell bowed, thankful no doubt that his way of putting it 
relieved her of the necessity for words. 

“You said in Leeuwarden that you didn’t know the two 
young ladies in Dutch costumes,” my uncle-in-law flung at me. 

“You may have gathered that impression. I certainly 
never said so,” I answered promptly — and truthfully too. 
“Perhaps I thought, at the time, that the less attention be- 
stowed on the ladies the better they would be pleased,” I 
added. 

“You were right,” remarked Nell, bravely. 

“Oh, very well,” said Sir Alec. Then, abruptly, “How’s 
the dog ?” 

“He’s as nice as ever,” replied the girl. 

Silence for an instant. MacNairne was visibly reflecting. 
The sight of Miss Van Buren, and her tacit confirmation of 
my statement, was cooling him down. He is a gentleman. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 397 
and a good fellow when not in one of his jealous rages; and 
evidently he did not wish to distress her, or shake her faith 
in a man she was going to marry. 

“I expected to find my wife on board this boat,” he said 
at last abruptly. “Is she here ?” 

“No,” said Nell, “she is not, and never has been.” 

“It’s your boat — not Brederode’s ?” 

“It’s my boat. He is — kindly acting as our skipper. If you 
would care to go below, and satisfy yourself that La — that 
your wife isn’t on board, please do so.” 

Sir Alec looked at her, and she looked at him, straight in 
the eyes, as why should she not, poor girl, having no guilty 
secret of her own to conceal ? 

“Thank’ you,” he said. “If I’ve your word for it, that’s 
enough. I won’t go below. Instead, I will bid you good after- 
noon, and get back to my own boat — if I can. But first — 
Starr, do you know where my wife is ?” 

“I don’t,” said I. “That I swear. I only wish I did, and I’d 
tell you like a shot. Why don’t you advertise in the papers: 
‘Come home. Forget and forgive. I’ll do the same.’ Or some- 
thing of the sort ? I’m perfectly sure that would fetch her, 
for she’s very fond of you, you know — or ought to know. 
She told me once that, in spite of all, you were one of the best 
fellows in the world.” 

“Did she really ?” the poor chap asked, his face flushing 
up — not with rage this time. 

“She did, indeed.” 

“Thank you,” he said absent-mindedly. He thought for 
a moment, and then spoke quickly, “Well, Brederode, I’m 
not sure that I oughtn’t to apologize.” 

“I am sure, Sir Alec,” Alb answered. But he was smiling. 

“Here goes, then.” The big Scotsman held out his hand. 
The tall Dutchman in the blue overalls took it. 

“I don’t know about you, Starr,” said Sir Alec. “I’m 


398 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

inclined to feel that you, at all events, have treated me rather 

badly. As my wife’s ” 

“I’ve meant well all through,” I broke in hurriedly. “And 
just now I gave you a bit of good advice. You’ll thank me 
when you’ve taken it.” 

“Perhaps I wi 1 take it, ” he muttered. 

“Hurrah!” said Alb. “The grand pressure of the whole 
flock of us is forcing the barrier apart. We shall make our 
way through in a few minutes now.” 

“Good-by, then, all,” exclaimed Sir Alec. “I must be get- 
ting back to my boat. The bargees don’t mind me much now 
it’s dawned on their intelligence that I’m neither mad nor an 
anarchist. Brederode, I congratulate you on your engagement 
to Miss Van Buren. I hope, Miss Van Buren, that you will be 
very happy. As for me, probably I shall leave Holland to-mor- 
row.” 

With that he turned his back upon us resolutely and made 
off, scrambling on board the barge jammed nearest “Mas- 
cotte’s” side. So he went on, from one to another, until he had 
disappeared from sight. 

“Miss Van Buren,” said Brederode, “can you forgive us ?” 

“It is hard,” she said, picking up a fold of her white dress 
and playing with it nervously. “But we won’t talk of it any 
more — ever. I must go now, and see how Lady MacNairne is.” 

“Not yet. One moment. There’s something I must say in jus- 
tice to myself,” Brederode persisted. 

She hesitated. And there was that in her face, that in his 
voice, which made me realize suddenly that my explanations 
were not needed. I could trust Alb not to give me away; 
and, as for him, he had forgotten all about me — so had Nell. 
And I crept off unnoticed. 

The one place for me was on board “Waterspin,” and before 
the barrier had done more than show signs of yielding I 
crawled over, slinking into my cabin. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 399 

“Well, well!” I said to myself. “Well, well!” I said again, 
with my head between my hands as I sat on my lonely bunk. 
There seemed nothing else to say. 

I stayed for a long time, until the press had broken, and 
we were going on at full speed once more. Then I went to 
a window of the kitchen, which Phyllis so much admired, and 
looked out. I could see the deck of “Mascotte,” and Brederode 
and Nell, who were still alone there together. 

“Well, well!” I repeated idiotically; “it’s I who did that. 
If it hadn’t been for me — but I don’t know. I suppose it was 
bound to happen, anyway. I wonder ?” 

Then I returned to my cabin and flitted about restlessly. 
Soon I became conscious that I was humming an air. It was 
not, in itself, a sad air; but there was a certain sadness as well 
as appropriateness in its meaning for me 

Giving agreeable girls away — 

One for you , and one for you , but never (how does it go?), 
never one for me ! 

We were stopping. We had come to Middelburg. I looked 
out again. Nell was on deck alone. Doubtless Alb had at last 
gone below to the motor-room, and was exchanging the blue 
overalls for something more decorous. Would he, even for 
the sake of conventionality, have left her at such a moment 
unless everything were settled ? 

“Mascotte” and “Waterspin” were at rest, and I could avail 
myself of Alb’s absence to find out if I liked. I was not at all 
sure that I did like. Nevertheless, something urged me to go, 
and before I quite knew how or why I had come there, I 
stood beside the pretty white figure. Nell looked up at me, 
radiant with emotion. 

“Oh, Mr. Starr, you were just the one I wanted to see,” 
she exclaimed. “I was willing you to come.” 


400 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“Well, I came,” I said, smiling. “I’m glad you want me.” 

“I want to ask you what to do. I sent him away. You know, 
we must stop on board till Lady MacNairne’s better, so — 
there’s no hurry, and — he had to change. At first he wouldn't 
go without an answer. But I told him I must have ten minutes 
to make up my mind. He’s explained everything. He was 
never to blame. It was all Freule Menela’s fault — and mine. 
Please say what you think. You know him so well; you’re 
old friends. There’s no one else I can talk to, and — I feel 
somehow — I have for a long time — almost as if you were 
a kind of — adopted brother.” 

Brother again! Blow after blow; let them fall now, one 
upon another. I had feared this, yet would not expect it. 
But I suppose I must unwittingly have been born a brother. 

“That’s right,” said I. “Go on — little sister.” The words 
were getting quite familiar now. 

“He says that he has never stopped loving me — dreadfully 
— desperately — from the very first. But I was so sure it was 
only a fancy, and — and that when I was so bad to him, and 
Phyllis so kind, he began to care for her instead. Just now, 
when you said I must pretend to be engaged to him, I was 
thinking how horrid it would be for him to feel, ‘Oh, if it were 
only Phyllis ! ’ Didn’t you suppose he was in love with Phyllis ?” 

“Never,” I heard myself assuring her; “never.” 

“I’m so glad. You’re sure, then, that he knows his own 
mind, that he isn’t asking me to go on being really engaged 
to him just to save my feelings after that scene with Sir Alec 
MacNairne ?” 

“I'm dead sure,” I said. 

“You perfect dear ! I do like you. Oh, wasn’t it too funny — 
I can say it, now we’re brother and sister — he thought I 
might be in love with you” 

“Owl !” I remarked. 

“And all the time I was so horribly afraid he might suspect 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 401 
I cared that I would hardly speak a word to him. Besides, 
I didn’t suppose he could be bothered listening to anything 
I might have to say. And I felt quite sorry for him when Phyl- 
lis was engaged to Robert. Dear Phil, I’ve been horrid to her, 
too. You see, she was trying to persuade herself to take Ru- 
dolph without loving him, and I just hated her for it.” 

“Oh, that was what you meant, then !” I exclaimed. 

“What I meant?” 

“It doesn’t matter. Well, make your mind easy, sweet sister. 
Alb adores you — has adored you since the first moment he 
set eyes on you, and will till he closes them in death. That’s 
my conviction as his lifetime friend. And my advice is, go on 
being engaged to him until you marry him.” 

“Mariner, what an old trump you are !” broke in Brederode. 
And there he was behind me, neat as a pin, in his own suit 
of clothes, and radiant in his new suit of happiness. 

“I give her to you, Alb,” said I. And then I strolled away 
again, humming to the air of the Dead March in Saul, or 
something equivalent, those haunting words — 

Giving agreeable girls away — 

One for you , and one for you , but never , never one for me ! 


XXXVII 


I FELT, when I waked up on the morning of butter- 
market-day at Middelburg, as if I had not slept at all, 
but had listened throughout the night to the sweet, the 
incredibly sweet chimes that floated like perfume in 
the air. Yet I suppose I must have slept, for the bells had 
sometimes stopped playing their one melodious tune, to tinkle 
in my dreams, “One for you, and one for you, but never, 
never one for me ?” 

The hotel is a nice hotel, and there is a garden. After break- 
fast, I was so tired of brotherliness, of beaming at happy 
couples, and hearing plans about weddings, that instead of 
going forth to see the famous Thursday Middelburg sights, at 
which the world comes from afar to gaze, I slipped away and 
hid in the garden. 

Phyllis and Robert were out together. Rudolph and Nell 
were out together. Both parties conscientiously believed that 
they were out for sight-seeing; that their object was to behold 
matrons and maidens in white caps, quaint fichus, meek, 
straight bodices, and swelling skirts; to admire pretty faces, 
with tinkling gold ornaments at their temples; to stare at 
young arms, red under incredibly tight short sleeves, as they 
bore baskets of eggs or pats of butter to market. How well I 
knew the whole scene from photographs ! — the bell-like figures 
of the women; the booths in the big market square; and the 
cool arcades of the butter-market. How well I knew, too, that 
neither Phyllis and Robert, nor Rudolph and Nell would see 
anything at all, or remember it, if by accident they did see aught 
save each other. 


402 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 403 

“This,” I said to myself, “is the end. We may go back to 
Rotterdam together, if we like. But everything’s as much 
changed as if it were another party. And this, this is what I’ve 
slaved for — fibbed for — plotted for ! ‘Giving agreeable girls 
away!’ Faugh!” I felt as much injured as if I were a mis- 
understood saint, though, when one comes to look at it, per- 
haps I have not always played precisely the part of saint. 

While I lolled gloomily on an extremely unoomfortable 
seat, not meant for lolling, I heard a faint rustling in the 
grass behind me, and Tibe appeared, to lay his head, in a 
matter-of-course way, upon my knee. 

“Where’s *your mistress?” I asked mechanically. “Have 
you changed, too, like all the rest, and left her alone ?” 

“Here I am,” answered the L.C.P., as if the question had 
been addressed to her. “I thought you’d be in the garden, so 
I came to find you. Why don’t you go out and see things ?” 

“Why don’t you ?” I echoed. 

“Because I didn’t like to feel that you were all by your- 
self,” she answered. 

“You needn’t have troubled about me,” I said. “Nobody 
else does.” 

She laughed that quaint, quiet little laugh, which suits her. 
“That’s different. They’re engaged to each other — all the 
rest of them. I’m engaged — by you.” 

“Don’t let that engagement keep you from amusing your- 
self,” I said. “The bargain’s off now. I hired an aunt to fur- 
ther my interests. Every one else’s have been furthered except 
mine.” 

“That’s not my fault, is it ?” 

“I know it isn’t,” I assured her. “Don’t think I’m finding 
fault with you. On the contrary, you’re really a marvelous 
being. But Othello’s occupation’s gone.” 

“Yes,” said she. “For both of us. I retire from aunthood, 
you retire from nephewhood, with mutual respect, Is that it ?” 


404 


THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

“I suppose so,” I gloomily replied. “Yet I’m loth to part 
with you, somehow. You and Tibe are all I have left in the 
world. But now I must lose you both.” 

“You don’t need an aunt,” she said. 

“No, but I need some one, I don’t know exactly who. 
Robert has snatched one of my loves, Rudolph the other. 
What am I to do ?” 

“Come to the house and into my sitting-room, and let’s talk 
it over,” she suggested invitingly. 

I obeyed. 

There were flowers in her sitting-room. There always are. 
The scent of late roses was sad, yet soothing. 

“Excuse me a minute. I’m going into the next room to 
make myself pretty before we begin our talk; but I won’t be 
long, and Tibe shall keep you company,” said the L.C.P. 

“You’re well enough as you are,” I said. 

But she went, smiling; and I hardly missed her, I was so 
busy with my own thoughts. 

One for you , and one jor you , but never , never one for me ? 

I must have hummed the words aloud, for her voice an- 
swered me, at the door. 

“Never’s a long word, isn’t it ?” 

I looked up. 

A neat little figure stood on the threshold between the two 
rooms, the same neat little figure I had seen constantly during 
the past eight weeks. But it was not the same face. She had 
said, lightly, that she was going to “make herself pretty,” and 
she had. She had performed a miracle. Or else I was asleep 
and dreaming. 

The gray hair, folded in wings, was gone; the blue glasses 
were gone; the big bow under the chin was gone. A pretty 
young woman was smiling at me with the pretty little mouth I 
knew; but I did not know the bright auburn hair, or the 
beautiful brown eyes ‘that threw me an amazing challenge. 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 405 

“Good heavens !” I exclaimed. 

“You told me you didn’t want your aunt any more,” said she. 

“Who are you ?” I asked. 

“Don’t you remember ? I’m Mary Milton. If you’d lived 
in your own country, instead of gadding about in foreign ones, 
you’d know who Mary Milton is without asking — at least, 
you would if you ever read The New York Meteor .” 

“I suppose this is a dream, and that I shall wake up,” said 
I. “I slept very badly last night.” 

“Don’t call for help under the impression that it’s a night- 
mare,” said my late aunt, twinkling. 

“I have the impression that it’s a vision,” I answered. “But 
if you don’t explain yourself instantly, I shall die the dream 
— of heart failure.” 

“There’s no great mystery,” said Miss Milton. “I didn’t 
particularly want to disguise myself, but you advertised for an 
aunt, and as it’s difficult for a girl to make herself look middle- 
aged, I had to look old. That’s all, except that your adver- 
tisement came in very handy, because — as you’d know if 
you were a patriotic American — Mary Milton’s an enter- 
prising and rather celebrated young journalist making it her 
business to go round the world for her paper without spending 
a penny of her own. That was the understanding on which 
TJie Meteor started and ‘ boomed ’ me; for it was my own idea. 
I wanted to see things, and I hadn’t money enough — so I 
went to call on the editor, and — I talked to him, till he was 
quite fired with the project. The Meteor has given me a good 
send-off, and I’ve given it good copy. My adventures — as 
they look in print — have been sensational, and, I believe, 
popular. I’ve been at it for two years, and all America has 
read me, if you haven’t. I’ve done all the countries of Europe, 
now. Holland was the last, and I seemed stuck on the thres- 
hold till I saw your advertisement. It couldn’t have suited 
better — except for the blue glasses and the wig. But one 


406 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

can’t have everything as one likes it. I’ve enjoyed the tour 
immensely, thanks to you; and so have the readers of The 
Meteor. I’m afraid I’ve teased you a good deal, and spent a 
lot of your pennies; but it was fun ! And you shall have your 
presents all back — every one of them Heaps of money will 
be waiting for me from my paper when I get home to New 
York. They’re delighted with my work; and then I intend to 
send you a check for all that you’ve paid me to be your aunt. I 
would rather, really; and only keep one little thing to remem- 
ber you by, perhaps — and our days together.” 

“Did you always send back the money spent by persons you 
hypnotized to conduct you through the different countries ?” 

“No. That was different. I — don’t exactly know why, 
but it was. And you needn’t look at me so queerly. I’ve never 
done anything to be ashamed of.” 

“I’d knock the person down who suggested that you had,” 
said I. “I was looking at you because I was thinking you more 
marvelous than ever. You hypnotize me. You hypnotize every- 
body. I suppose you hypnotized the editor into giving you 
your job ?” 

“Perhaps I did,” she laughed. “Often I can get people to do 
things for me — big things — if I want them to very much.” 

“You could get me to do anything!” I exclaimed. “You’re 
a witch, and what’s more, I believe you’re a beauty. Great 
Scott ! How you grow on one ! Can this be why — because 
you are You — that in my heart of hearts I don’t care a rap if 
Nell and Phyllis are engaged to others ? I wonder if my in- 
stinct saw under the gray hair and blue glasses ? Look here, 
are you Miss or Mrs. Mary Milton ? and if you’re Mrs., are 
you a widow, grass, or otherwise ?” 

She laughed. “Why, how old do you take me to be ? As an 
aunt, my official age was over forty. But Miss Mary Milton 
isn’t much more than half Lady MacNairne’s age. It’s as 
good to throw off the years as the wig and the spectacles. I’m 


RONALD LESTER STARR’S POINT OF VIEW 407 
only twenty-three. I haven’t had time to marry yet, thank 
goodness !” 

“Thank goodness!” I echoed. “And thank goodness for 
You as you are. You seem to me perfect.” 

“But I should never have done like this, for an aunt.” 

“Certainly not. But to think I should have been wasting 
you all this time as a mere aunt!” 

“I wasn’t wasted. I saved you lots of things — if I didn’t 
save you money. Really, I did earn my salary — though you 
often thought me officious.” 

“Never!” 

“Not when I kept you from proposing to Nell Van Buren ?” 

“That was a blessing in disguise.” 

“Like myself. But truly, I only did it to spare you humilia- 
tion in the end. I knew all along that she was in love with 
Rudolph Brederode — though perhaps she wouldn’t have 
found it out so soon if it hadn’t been for me.” 

“You’ve been our good genius all round,” said I. “And 
I owe you ” 

“Now, don’t offer me more rewards ! It was fun wheedling 
things from you at first; but bribes have been getting on my 
nerves lately. The play was played out.” 

“Let’s pretend it was only a curtain-raiser,” I suggested. 
“I’d like you to be ‘on’ in the next piece, in the leading part. 
Mary Milton ! What a delicious name ! And you're delicious ! 
It’s a great comfort to understand why I was never really in 
love with either of those Angels. You are not an angel — but 
I’m going to be madly in love with you. I feel it coming on. 
I shall adore you.” 

“Nonsense ! A man mustn’t be in love with his aunt.” 

“I strip you of your aunthood. But I can’t give you up to 
The Meteor . If you go to America, you must personally con- 
duct Ronald Lester Starr. You oughtn’t to mind. You’re used 
to looking after him.” 


408 THE BOTOR CHAPERON 

I took a step toward her; but she stooped down and 
framed the ugly pansy of Tibe’s face between her little hands. 

“Tibe, what do you say to him ?” she asked. 

Tibe wagged his tail. 

While he was wagging, the others came in.. Their looks of 
radiant new happiness changed to surprise at sight of my 
companion. In spite of the dress nobody recognized the pretty 
girl with the wonderful eyes and crisp masses of sparkling 
auburn hair. 

Yesterday I would have sacrificed anything, up to Tibe him- 
self, to avoid explanations, but now I enjoyed them. 

Everybody laughed and exclaimed (except Robert), and 
Bred erode helped me out so nobly that I would have given 
him Nell with my own hand if she had not already made him 
that present. 

“It’s like one of Nell’s stories,” cried Phyllis. “Only she 
used to love to make hers end sadly.” 

“I should have died if this had ended sadly,” Nell said 
frankly, holding out both hands to Brederode, with a lovely 
look in her eyes. 

“So should I, I’m sure,” said Phyllis. “Oh, isn’t it glorious 
that we all adore each other so!” 

“Do we ?” I asked the Meteor lady. 

She smiled. “I suppose it would be a pity to make a jarring 
note in the chorus.” 

While she was in that mood I took out the ruby ring which 
she had said ought to be an engagement ring. 

“With this ring I thee ” 

“No!” 

“Engage thee as my perpetual chaperon. ” 

This time she did not draw back her hand. And I kissed it 
as I slipped on the ruby. 


THE END 


3 1907 













COPY DFt TO OAT, Q5V* 

AUG 3 1907 


AUG 7 290/ 



